The Czech Republic could receive the first U.S. subsidy in support of science and research to be allotted in connection with the planned building of a U.S. radar base on Czech soil by late September, the Czech news agency CTK reported on Tuesday.
"This is the first funding connected with the radar," Vladimir Marik, who is heading the team mapping suitable projects in the Czech Republic said.
U.S. experts are now to decide about support for some of eight selected Czech research projects, said Marik.
Marik, from the Czech Technical University (CVUT), said eight projects had been shortlisted in eight fields, such as nanomaterial, robotics, laser technology, radiolocation equipment and medicine.
They have been submitted by the Czech Academy of Sciences, universities as well as private firms, he added.
The U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA) is to release the first subsidy for Czech science by the end of September, Marik said, but he did not specify the sum.
Czech-U.S. cooperation in science and research is embedded in one of the bilateral agreements complementing the main radar treaty that Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg and U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice signed in Prague in July.
The United States is to offer dozens of millions of crowns to fund scientific research in the Czech Republic, mainly in the armament industry, as part of the radar base talks between the two countries, Czech media reported in June.
Czech First Deputy Foreign Minister Tomas Pojar left for the United States where he would negotiate the funding of Czech research projects on Tuesday, according to CTK.
The United States plans to build a radar base in the Czech Republic, along with an interceptor missile base in Poland, as part of its East European missile defense shield.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg signed the main treaty on the base in early July.
Russia is strongly opposed to the deployment of the system, saying it poses a threat to its national security. Czech opposition parties and some 70 percent of the country's citizens also oppose the project.
The radar treaties are yet to be ratified by the Czech parliament. It is not clear whether the government will muster enough votes for the treaty's ratification in parliament.
(Xinhua News Agency September 3, 2008)
