Leading Czech monthly Mezinárodní politika (International Politics) has issued a special edition on Korean history and politics. A special issue published this July contains interview with incumbent Czech Ambassador to the Republic of Korea, two short comments on recent developments on Korean peninsula and twelve long articles written by both Czech and foreign experts: a.o. the first British diplomat resident in Pyongyang Jim Hoare, Polish human-rights activist Joanna Hosaniak, EU Ambassador to Seoul Brian McDonald, former Czech Ambassador to Beijing, Pyongyang and Seoul Tomáš Smetánka, doyen of Czech Koreanists professor Vladimír Pucek as well as Czech Radio North East Asian correspondent Robert Mikoláš to name only a few.

Published texts cover the wide range of topics and were carefully selected by a team of editors led by Robert Schuster working in the Institute of International Relations, the most authoritative Czech foreign policy think-tank based in Prague. Three articles deal with historical topics, Martin Vlnas discusses the pros and cons of the rule of president Park Chung-hee, prof. Pucek summarizes the history of Czech Korean studies and former ambassador Smetánka unveils a history of Czech and Czechoslovak membership in Neutral Nations Supervisory Commision.

Recent political and economic developments in the Republic of Korea are dealt with by Vladimír Beroun, who analyzes the political carreer and the first two years of president Lee Myung-bak s administration, Viktor Hollmann covers the succeses of Korean  information technologies, and Naděžda Vlnasová unveils the approaches of RoK s government to global financial crisis.

Position of the Republic of Korea in the region and her relations with the North, are the topics of the articles written by Jim Hoare who evaluates the Sunshine Policy, defence expert Daniel Strauch, writing about the concepts of anti-missile defense on Korean peninsula, Joanna Hosaniak describes the situation of North Korean refugees, sinologist Rudolf Furst deals with RoK s relations with China and EU ambassador to Seoul Brian McDonald depicts the future of EU-RoK Free Trade Agreement. North-South relations are also a main topic in a text written by film expert Michal Procházka, who summarizes the cinematic vision(s) of Korean war in films produced in both Koreas.

The magazine, launched in 1957, is an influential publication among the Czech policy makers as well as students of international relations. Published by Institute of International Relations, loosely affiliated with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic, it is now in its 34th year of publication, as it was closed down as „reactionist“ after the Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1969 and was only relaunched after the fall of communism in Czechoslovakia in 1990.

It is published in the Czech language and offers analyses and commentaries, as well as important documents published by the international organizations, such as United Nations, European Union, NATO, and OSCE, as well as book reviews. It provides a platform for an open discussion on international relations and questions of Czech contemporary foreign policies. More about the magazine could be found at www.iir.cz