Czechs vote in presidential election run-off, tight race expected

Czech citizens will have until 2pm on Saturday to cast their votes as polls opened on Friday for the run-off in the presidential election. The incumbent Milos Zeman is facing challenger Jiri Drahos, the former head of the Czech Academy of Sciences. Zeman, 73, is favored to win another five-year term, but polls suggest it could be a tight race, AP said. In 2013 Zeman, then a former left-leaning prime minister, became president after defeating former conservative Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg in the second round of the election. Zeman, seen as a Russia-friendly politician, was one of the few European leaders to endorse Donald Trump’s bid for the White House. He flew the EU flag at Prague Castle, but also proposed a referendum on the country’s membership in the bloc. Drahos links the country’s future to its EU and NATO memberships.