Czech President Zeman launches re-election bid

Czech President Milos Zeman, an ex-communist known for staunch anti-Muslim, pro-Russian and pro-Chinese views, said Thursday he would run for a second five-year term in a presidential vote scheduled for 2018.

"I have decided to run for president of the Czech Republic again," the 72-year-old veteran leftwinger told his fans at a party held four years after he took office as the EU member's first-ever directly elected president.

Known for supporting US President Donald Trump, Zeman once called the recent migrant wave in Europe an "organised invasion" and labelled the migrant-friendly policy of German Chancellor Angela Merkel as "nonsense".

Zeman's term has so far been marked by disputes with Social Democrat Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka.

The president has openly backed Sobotka's chief rival, the billionaire Andrej Babis, whose junior coalition ANO movement is widely tipped to win a parliamentary election in autumn.

Zeman's policy has struck a chord in small towns and villages but angered those living in Prague and other major cities.

Zeman's foes have questioned his health, since he suffers from impaired hearing and diabetic neuropathy, which forces him to walk with a cane.

A chain smoker, Zeman once confessed to a daily diet of six glasses of wine and three shots of spirits -- an amount doctors have made him cut since he became head of state.

In February, Zeman scored 54-percent in a confidence survey by the Czech Academy of Sciences, easily beating out the cabinet with 37 percent and the lower house of parliament with 26 percent.