Czech Officials Get Into Fist Fight

Presidential advisor and former member of Czech parliament Miroslav Macek,right, confronts Health Minister David Rath after he slapped Rath on the back of the head prior to the meeting of dentists protesting against Raths policies in Prague on Saturday May 20,2006. Macek attacked Rath for his previous remarks about Maceks wife. This incident between senior members of the country's two leading political parties comes less than two weeks before parliamentary elections that will take place on on June 2-3. (AP Photo/CTK, Ladislav Solc) (Ladislav Solc - AP)

PRAGUE, Czech Republic -- Czech's health care minister and an adviser to President Vaclav Klaus got into a fistfight in a confrontation captured by TV cameras.

The fight happened Saturday in front of a group of dentists.

Former Vice Prime Minister Miroslav Macek, a dentist by profession who was invited to moderate a discussion of Czech dentists with David Rath, slapped Rath on the back of his head in front of the perplexed audience _ and TV cameras _ saying he was settling a private matter with him. Rath called Macek a coward, and the two exchanged punches.

The fight made it to all Czech prime-time television news programs Saturday.

General elections are to be held June 2-3, and Rath _ the leading candidate for the governing Social Democrats in the Prague district _ has alleged the attack was politically motivated.

Macek, a member of the center-right Civic Democratic Party, denied any political motives, saying Rath had insulted his wife.

In a newspaper interview earlier this month, Rath was quoted as saying Macek had always dated young women but then married an older woman for money.

"It was a purely private matter," the daily Mlada Fronta Dnes quoted Macek as saying.

The Civic Democratic Party said Macek should consider resigning from the party because of the incident.