The Czech deputy minister of industry, Milada Vlasakova, said yesterday that Electricite de France is intensely interested in assets in the privatization of the Czech energy sector. This is not surprising, but the room for negotiating a sale with the government is extremely limited given the Cabinet’s strict privatization conditions. A new plan of how to proceed with energy-sector privatization is due by the end of February, following the cancellation of a tender earlier this month; we expect the privatization to be halted for the moment. Neutral.
(Jiri Soustruznik)