The City of Prague is drafting its own bill regulating prostitution and most Czech municipalities support it, Stehlikova said after a meeting of a working group that discusses the regulation of prostitution.

The passage of such a law would mean that prostitution would be considered a method of legal business activity. If the bill drafted by the Prague Town Hall experts is approved by the Prague authority it could be submitted to the parliament this year.

"I view the process of the legalization of prostitution as a very complicated from the political point of view. I am afraid that it is a long-distance run, a question of two to three years before such a bill is submitted to the parliament," Stehlikova said.

She said she had distributed a questionnaire among the authorities of 80 Czech municipalities, beginning with the smallest and ending with large cities, asking them to express their position on the regulated prostitution.

Stehlikova said that 89 percent of them supported the bill and 83 percent approved of prostitution as a method of business activity.

Three years ago, the Czech government approved a bill on prostitution drafted by the Interior Ministry and submitted it to the Chamber of Deputies.

However, the deputies rejected the government's proposal to abrogate the international Convention for the Suppression of the Traffic in Persons and Abuse of Prostitution that was the condition for the parliament to pass the law regulating prostitution.

The Czech Republic at present does not have any legal norm regulating prostitution.

Mayor of the north Bohemian town of Dubi notorious of large number of prostitutes complained that at present "the municipality does not have any means to regulate prostitution."

"Many citizens have become victims of this activity," he said.

"The advantage of such a law would be that it would introduce the general ban on the provision of sexual services in municipalities, but would allow the authorities to define spaces where prostitutes would be able to offer their services," Stehlikova said.

The bill on prostitution is also aimed to curb involuntary prostitution and organized crime and protect prostitutes and their clients against the risk of HIV virus, Stehlikova said.

According to analyses, there are 75 facilities in Prague offering sexual services in which 3000 people work.

In the whole of the Czech Republic, up to 13,000 people offer sexual services, according to estimates.

Resource: CTK, Czech Republic