Czech party says ministers may quit govt - paper

                                
 PRAGUE, July 11 (Reuters) - The Czech Green Party said its
ministers may quit the cabinet over questions surrounding the 
personal finances of the head of another government party, daily
Pravo reported on Friday.
                                
 The Greens have four ministers in the centre-right cabinet.
The three-party ruling coalition has just 100 votes in the
200-seat lower house of parliament.
                                
 The next election is due in 2010 and the cabinet's main
tasks include ratification of a treaty to host part of a U.S.
missile defence shield, approval of the European Union's Lisbon
treaty and holding the EU's rotating presidency in the first
half of 2009.
                                
 Popular Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg, an independent
nominated by the Greens, has threatened to leave if an audit he
ordered raises questions over the income of Deputy Prime
Minister Jiri Cunek, head of the Christian Democrat party.
                                
 Party chief Martin Bursik said the others may follow.
                                
 "If Karel Schwarzenberg sets some ethical bar, I do not
think the Greens should lower it somehow," Pravo quoted Bursik
as saying.
                                
 Cunek had been investigated for alleged bribe taking but the
case has been dropped. He returned to the cabinet in April after
stepping down for five months while under investigation.
                                
 Schwarzenberg has said he would look into the findings of
the audit he commissioned in the coming days.
                                
 A departure of the Green ministers would not automatically
lead to the government's collapse, but would further seriously
weaken its position in parliament.
                                
 The government has pushed through a revamp of the tax system
and cut the budget deficit, and plans a range of changes to the
health and pension systems.
                                
 Analysts have said all the government parties have an
incentive to keep the cabinet afloat, given their poor standing
in opinion polls and a lack of alternative power-sharing
scenarios.
 (Reporting by Jan Lopatka; editing by Keith Weir)