40-Minute Czech

Category: File - :Burgkarlstein01.jpg|thumb|Karl?tejn Castle in the Central Bohemian Region, founded in 1348 by Charles IV.

Category: File - :Tabor CZ aerial old town from north B1.jpg|thumb|Tábor, a town in the South Bohemian Region, founded in 1420 by the Hussites.

[IV. (HRR).jpg|thumb|Charles IV, eleventh king of Bohemia. Charles IV was elected the Nejv?t?í ?ech (Greatest Czech) of all time.[http://www.radio.cz/en/article/67495 Emperor Charles IV elected Greatest Czech of all time, Radio Prague]]

The Czech Republic Oxford English Dictionary, second edition, Oxford University Press, 1989. (, , short form ?esko ) is a country in Central Europehttp://unstats.un.org/unsd/geoinfo/gegn23wp48.pdf. The country borders Poland to the northeast, Germany to the west and northwest, Austria to the south and Slovakia to the east. The capital and largest city is Prague (). The country is composed of the historic regions of Bohemia and Moravia, as well as parts of Silesia. The Czech Republic has been a member of NATO since 1999 and of the European Union since 2004. From 1 January 2009 to 1 July 2009, the Czech Republic held the Presidency of the Council of the European Union.

Following the Battle of Mohács in 1526, the Czech lands fell under Habsburg rule, becoming part of the Austrian Empire in 1804 and of Austria?Hungary in 1867. The independent Republic of Czechoslovakia was formed in 1918, following the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian empire after World War I. After the Munich Agreement, German occupation of Czechoslovakia and the consequent disillusion with the Western response and gratitude for the liberation of the major portion of Czechoslovakia by the Red Army, the Communist party won plurality (38%)Libri.cz in the 1946 elections. In a 1948 coup d'état, Czechoslovakia became a communist-ruled state. In 1968, the increasing dissatisfaction culminated in attempts to reform the communist regime. The events, known as the Prague Spring of 1968, ended with an invasion by the armies of the Warsaw Pact countries (with the exception of Romania); the troops remained in the country until the 1989 Velvet Revolution, when the communist regime collapsed. On 1 January 1993, Czechoslovakia peacefully dissolved into its constituent states, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

The Czech Republic is a pluralist multi-party parliamentary representative democracy. President Václav Klaus is the current head of state. The Prime Minister is the head of government (currently Jan Fischer). The Parliament has two chambers: the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. It is also a member of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the Council of Europe and the Visegrád Group.

The Czech Republic made economic reforms such as fast privatizations. Annual gross domestic product growth has recently been around 6%. The country is the first former member of the Comecon to achieve the status of a developed country (2006), according to the World Bank. The Czech Republic also ranks top among the former Comecon countries in the Human Development Index.Statistics of the Human Development Report.

Prague (; , see also Category: Names of European cities in different languages - : M-P#P|other names) is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Nicknames for Prague have included "the mother of cities" (Praga mater urbium, or "Praha matka m?st" in Czech), "city of a hundred spires", or Stov??atá Praha in Czech and "the golden city" or Zlaté m?sto in Czech.

Situated on the Vltava River in central Bohemia, Prague has been the political, cultural and economic centre of the Czech state for more than 1100 years. For many decades during the Gothic and Renaissance eras, Prague was the permanent seat of two Holy Roman Emperors and thus was also the capital of the Holy Roman Empire.

Today, the city proper is home to more than 1.2 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 1.9 million.

Since 1992, the extensive historic centre of Prague has been included in the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites, making the city one of the most popular tourist destinations in Europe, receiving more than 4.1 million international visitors annually, .