[Mb-civic] CBC News - SCANDAL BRINGS DOWN CZECH PM

Mon Apr 25 05:40:43 PDT 2005

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SCANDAL BRINGS DOWN CZECH PM
WebPosted Mon Apr 25 05:52:34 2005

PRAGUE---The Czech Republic's prime minister resigned Monday in a
controversy over who paid for his luxury apartment six years ago.

Stanislav Gross, who at 35 was the European Union's youngest prime
minister, submitted his own resignation and that of his cabinet to
President Vaclav Klaus, a spokesperson for Klaus said.

Gross was also chair of the country's Social Democrats.

That party's vice-chair, Jiri Paroubek, 52, was widely expected to be
sworn in as prime minister to replace Gross. He would become the Czech
Republic's third prime minister within nine months.

Paroubek would then name a new cabinet, likely to be much the same as the
one chosen by Gross.

In recent weeks, Gross had given conflicting stories about how his
apartment was funded in 1999, when he was living on a modest
government salary.

Initially, he said he had taken out a mortgage. Then he claimed he had
borrowed funds from an uncle.

Media reports later said Gross's uncle had borrowed the money from a
journalist to help his nephew, and political opponents questioned what
strings were attached to the loan.