combating violent, online, and property-related crime. Last but not least, we
must consistently fight hate crime and stand up against verbal and physical
manifestations of hatred, including attacks on democratic values, because
hatred radicalizes, fragments, undermines, and destabilizes societies.
119. A functioning criminal justice system able to flexibly respond to changing
security risks is another crucial enabler for internal security. The Government
must keep tailoring the system’s capacity to the current needs, and it must
protect judicial independence from any interference. Only an independent
justice system, resilient to outside influences, can hand down just and fair
rulings to promote confidence in the democratic rule of law and in a State that
delivers security for its people.
123. We need to develop our civil protection system in a way reflecting the
trends in the security environment, socio-economic influences, as well
as our acceptance of the fact that unforeseen events may occur and that
their impacts on our society may be profound. To this end, the Government
facilitates organizational, material, and financial support measures to
improve civil protection, including volunteerism. The Government promotes
the development of our civil preparedness system since a population that
takes a responsible approach and acts in the right way can do a lot to prevent
emergencies and lessen the impacts. The Ministry of the Interior coordinates
the integrated rescue system and develops the operational capability of all
elements, including volunteer firefighters who are to get a greater role in
emergency response and civil protection.
120. The Czech Republic will ensure that the bodies responsible for internal security
have the human resources, organizational, material, and technological
capacities they need to efficiently perform these functions and adequately
prevent and deal with the security phenomena.
124. In crisis situations, the Government uses a system of emergency economic
measures (coordinated by the State Material Reserves Administration) to
facilitate supplies of the necessary material in cases where responsibility for
supplying the material rests with bodies at any level of the crisis management
system and the material cannot be obtained in a standard way.
f. Civil protection and crisis management
125. Czechia builds the non-military elements of its defence capability, especially
in the context of our commitment to meeting NATO’s baseline requirements
for resilience of our State and society. We utilize and help develop the EU Civil
Protection Mechanism for disaster prevention, preparedness, and response.
This also involves having in place civil protection means and arrangements.
Czechia has set out to improve its all-hazards response capability.
121. The Ministry of Interior’s responsibility is to make our State and society
resilient to crises of non-military nature. This involves coordinating the nonmilitary crisis management system, and building the expertise needed to
plan, prepare, coordinate and align the roles of public authorities and private
stakeholders. Upcoming legislative changes will facilitate the development of
the State’s single crisis management documentation reflecting the changed
security environment. The Ministry of the Interior will continue to improve
the crisis management tools, especially the national crisis management
information system.
122. Resilient critical infrastructure provides essential support for the vital
functions of the State. The Government will consider new developments
relating to critical infrastructure protection in the light of EU legislation. It
will review the criteria for determining which infrastructures are critical and
expand the rights and duties of State bodies and other critical infrastructure
actors. The Government will initiate a legislative change to consolidate and
bring under one act the rules for critical infrastructure and critical information
infrastructure. This will optimize our crisis management system and improve
the resilience of the State and private stakeholders in managing crisis
situations.
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g. Other important areas of strategic concern
126. Czechia’s security interests require us to pay strategic attention to many other
areas, such as environmental protection, pandemic security, social cohesion,
societal security, protection of the rule of law, supply chain security, and food
security.
127. We need a whole-of-society effort to reduce the risk of human-made and
natural disasters, and to adapt to climate change. The main coordinator is
the Ministry of the Environment. The Environment Ministry’s core strategy
documents, based on the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 20152030, include the Environmental Security Strategy of the Czech Republic 20212030 with outlook to 2050, Strategy on Adaptation to Climate Change in the
Czech Republic, and the State Environmental Policy of the Czech Republic
2030 with outlook to 2050. The Environment Ministry has developed basic
emergency management documentation for newly defined emergency
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