History of the Representation
The European Office of the Pilsen Region in Brussels began its operations on 3 January 2006 as a detached workplace of the Pilsen Region Authority. Its first representative was Karel Lizerot. To facilitate its initial activities, colleagues from the East Midlands European Office (which also includes the Northamptonshire region, a partner region of the Pilsen Region) provided office space at Avenue d’Auderghem 22–28, 1040 Brussels. The office remained there until June 2007, when it moved to its own rented premises in the so-called “Czech House” at Rue du Trône 60, B-1050 Brussels. The Czech House in Brussels was a project linked to the first-ever Czech Presidency of the Council of the EU, which took place in the first half of 2009. For this purpose, the Permanent Representation of the Czech Republic to the EU needed to increase the number of diplomats and secure adequate office space.
Czech House
These premises were found in a building adjacent to the Permanent Representation at Rue Caroly 15, where the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic rented the entire office building. However, the Permanent Representation only required part of the space, so the remaining offices were offered to other Czech entities in Brussels. As a result, several organisations came together under one roof: Czech Airlines, Czech Railways, CzechTrade/CzechInvest, CzechTourism, the Czech Centre, the Czech Business Representation CEBRE, the Embassy of the Czech Republic in Belgium, and, importantly, a “regional floor” with offices for Czech regions. Not all regions made use of this opportunity. Those that did not include:
- The Capital City of Prague, which has had its own premises at Avenue Palmerston 16 since June 2002
- The Central Bohemian Region, which at the time rented its own building at Avenue d’Auderghem 45, Brussels-Etterbeek
- The South Bohemian Region, which sublet office space from the Central Bohemian Region
- The Liberec Region, which also sublet space from the Central Bohemian Region
- The Zlin and Olomouc Regions, which were represented by a lobbying agency
The Czech House thus hosted the offices of the South Moravian, Karlovy Vary, Hradec Králové, Moravian-Silesian, Pardubice, Pilsen, Ústí nad Labem Regions, and the Vysočina Region.
New Representative of the Pilsen Region
At that time, the representative of the Pilsen Region in Brussels was Mgr. Zbyněk Prokop, who took over the agenda from Karel Lizerot on 1 January 2007. The Czech House project in Brussels—intended to provide shared facilities for all Czech offices under one roof under favourable conditions—was a very promising initiative. Unfortunately, it proved too ambitious to last: the Czech Republic did not complete the purchase of the rented building, and the Czech House project came to an end in 2011.
