Prague - Czech coal miner New World Resources (NWR) said Monday it plans to buy a 25-per-cent share in the Ukrainian iron ore pellet producer Ferrexpo from RPG Industries, NWR's majority shareholder.

The mining group said it will pay 163.3 million euros (220.1 million dollars) for the stake that RPG Industries bought earlier in October.

"We are taking advantage of a unique market opportunity to secure a significant holding in Ferrexpo at an attractive valuation," NWR's executive chairman Miklos Salamon said in a statement.

NWR said the acquisition will be fully funded from its cash position that stood at 668 million euros on June 30.

Prague - The opposition Social Democratic Party issued a shockingly heavy blow to Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek in the Czech Republic's regional and Senate elections, final results showed Saturday. 

As a consequence Topolanek's position as a party leader and possibly as a premier looked shaky just 10 weeks before his country takes over the European Union's rotating presidency. 

The Social Democrats took all 13 regions where voting took place, their first such success since 2000 when regions came to existence, the Czech Statistical Office said. 

Prague - As the last votes in regional and Senate elections in the Czech Republic were counted Saturday, the opposition Social Democratic Party looked as if they had issued a heavy blow to Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek.

"The voters want change," Social Democratic leader Jiri Paroubek told the public broadcaster Czech Television.

The Social Democrats took all 13 regions where voting took place, their first such success since 2000.

Prague- Counting began in the Czech Republic's regional and Senate election Saturday as polling stations closed.

Czechs were picking 27 from 81 members of the upper house, the Senate, and governments of country's 13 regions.

Both the Senate and regional governments have been controlled by the senior ruling Civic Democratic Party of Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek.

Analysts expect Topolanek's party to lose its dominance, which could affect his rule and country's ratification of EU's reform Lisbon Treaty just months before the Czech Republic's presidency of the 27-member bloc.

Prague - Czech officials and travel agents welcomed Washington's decision, announced Friday by US President George W Bush, to allow Czechs to travel to the United States without visas.

But some citizens said the new policy, set to go into effect within a month, came too late.

"It is virtually the largest success we could have achieved. It lifts the last relic of communism and the Cold War. I am thus very happy," Czech Prime Minister Topolanek said in a statement.

Some Czechs pointed out that the relic held out for a long 19 years.