White House officially announces President Obama's Prague visit

The goal of Obama's visit will be the building of a stronger partnership between the USA and the EU that will allow to jointly better deal with joint problems, according to the White House statement.

On his visit to the Czech Republic Obama will be accompanied by his wife Michelle.

Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek whose country holds the EU rotating presidency announced Obama's visit to Prague to attend an informal EU-USA summit almost a week ago. However, the American side has so far not commented on Obama's planned visit.

The White House's statement does not contain the visit's programme.

Topolanek said at the beginning of this week without giving any details that Obama would deliver a "European speech of the year" in Prague.

According to available information from Prague, bilateral talks between Obama and Topolanek and a meeting of the two countries' presidents have also been scheduled.

The Czech public and political scene are expecting Obama to outline the new U.S. administration's plans for the stationing of parts of the U.S. missile defence system in Europe. The USA is to build a radar base in the Brdy military district, 90 km southwest of Prague, and a base for ten interceptor missiles in Poland.

Russia sharply protests against the bases that, according to the American side, are to provide the protection against a possible threat, mainly from Iran. Russia views the stationing of the parts of the U.S. missile defence system in Europe as a threat to its national security.

American and Czech politicians have recently indicated that if Iran were convinced to give up its controversial nuclear programme, there might be changes in the plans of the stationing of the U.S. missile defence in Europe.

Obama said a few weeks ago that the reduction of the Iranian nuclear programme would lower the need for the missile defence shield.

According to the Czech EU presidency, the topics of the Prague EU-USA summit should be the global financial architecture, the consequences of the current global financial crisis, the problems of the trans-Atlantic security and military cooperation, other foreign policy questions, energy and climate.

Czech President Vaclav Klaus sent an official invitation to Obama to visit Prague immediately after his inauguration on January 21.

The White House has also announced other points in Obama's European tour which, however, have been known for a long time.

Before coming to Prague, Obama will attend a meeting of the economic summit G20 in London on April 2.

Author: ČTK
www.ctk.cz