Czech govt coalition divided over US radar, Lisbon treaty votes

(PRAGUE) - Politicians from two of the Czech government's ruling centre-right coalition parties clashed Sunday over impending votes on the EU Lisbon Treaty and a controversial US anti-missile radar base.

Green Party Education Minister Ondrej Liska warned the main right-wing government party, the Civic Democratic Party (ODS), that it "is playing a dangerous game" if it links support for ratification of the Lisbon Treaty with a demand that Green Party lawmakers support the US anti-missile radar.

Failure by the Czech Republic to ratify the Lisbon Treaty by the target date of the end of this year could be fatal to the current three-way coalition government, Liska added in a debate on Czech public television.

Tensions between the senior and junior government coalition parties have been sharpened in recent days over the treaty and radar.

Anger within the ODS has been stoked by statements from several Green lawmakers they would not back the US radar in a parliamentary vote, where Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek chances of pushing through the controversial base deal appear uncertain. Liska also refused this month to vote in cabinet for approval of the main diplomatic deal over the radar already hammered out with the US.

The Green Party in turn fears the Civic Democrats are prepared to block ratification of the Lisbon Treaty, disliked by eurosceptic elements within the rightwing party, until the radar agreement is voted through.

"These two issues are linked," ODS European Parliament lawmaker, Jan Zahradil said on the broadcast, pointing out that the radar was a major policy priority for his party and a vote against it would have a serious impact on relations with the US.

He insisted however that his party is not seeking to make a formal link between parliamentary votes on the two issues.

The US wants to site an anti-missile radar in the Czech Republic, twinned with interceptor missiles in neighbouring Poland, to counter the threat of an attack from what it calls "rogue states."

The plans have aroused anger in Russia which has denounced the project as a threat to its domestic security.

ODS upper house lawmakers have already stalled Prague's ratification of the Lisbon Treaty by calling on the country's highest court court to comb through it to determine if it does not clash with the Czech constitution.