The Czech Republic should forge closer ties with the liberal allies of the EU, said the opposition Pirates Party chairman Ivan Bartos on Friday.
Bartos wants the country to withdraw from the Visegrad Four (V4) group.
The 41-year-old software engineer says the group partners, Hungary and Poland, are democratic failures.
“The Czech Republic should aim toward liberal Western Europe,” Bartos said in an interview.
He said he appreciates the benefits of culture-collaboration, education and transport as a member of the V4, which includes Slovakia.
However, he said that in Europe, nobody wants to partner with countries having authoritarian tendencies.
“Human rights are clipped and people are bullied for different sexual orientation, both in Hungary and Poland,” he added.
The opposition Pirates Party has been in power since 2017 and has focused on transparency, democracy, e-government and cannabis legislation.
The Party considers itself progressive-liberal.
Also, it has repeatedly disputed with the PM Andrej Babis, who it accuses of favoring his interests over the country’s.
The opposition parties’ plans
The Pirates’ European perspective makes them different from Babis, whose campaign defends the sovereignty from Brussels and relations with Orban.
It is in a coalition with the centrist STAN party as opposition groups that hope for Babis’ fall in the coming election in October.
The opposition coalition came on top of the opinion polls in the spring when people rebuked the government for dealing with the pandemic.
It has since dropped to third place, behind Babis’ populist ANO party and the opposition center-right coalition SPOLU (Together),
Since then, it went down to third place after Babis’ populist ANO party and the opposition center-right coalition SPOLU.
However, Bartos said the party has passed a milestone and would be a stronger partner in the new government.
Bartos said the Pirates would review a fresh process for a new bloc at CEZ’s Dukovany nuclear power plant.
The government arranges to open the power plant after the election.
“This includes a price cap and involvement of the Czech industry, as well as research,” he continued.
He added that China and Russia would remain banned on security grounds.
