The Czech government has approved amendments to the law on Ukrainian refugees, which tighten certain conditions for stay and receiving assistance.
This is reported by the local media Novinky.
In particular, the authorities want to cancel temporary protection if a person has been outside the Schengen area for more than 30 days. Also, Ukrainians receiving humanitarian aid will have to stay in the Czech Republic for at least 16 days per month.
The government explains this by wanting to prevent payments to people who do not actually live in the country. At the same time, short trips abroad, including to visit relatives or on business, will remain permitted without losing the right to payments.
The amendments also provide for the mandatory registration in the Czech Republic of certain cars with Ukrainian license plates. In addition, they want to cancel the exception that exempted Ukrainian cars from technical inspections.
If these amendments pass both houses of parliament and are signed by the president, the changes will come into effect on January 1, 2027, and the vehicle regulations will come into effect on January 1, 2028.
- According to Czech Interior Minister Lubomir Metnar, as of March, there were over 385 000 Ukrainian refugees in the Czech Republic, of whom almost 90 000 were receiving humanitarian assistance.
- The minister also reported that since the beginning of the year, authorities have uncovered several hundred cases of abuse of the system, and the police have opened more than 40 criminal cases with losses of more than 18 million crowns.
For more news and in-depth stories from Ukraine, please follow us on X.