Update:
The mayor of Prague, Pavel Bem, denied he was in Antarctica to climb on Mount Vinson, the Czech mainstream media idnes.cz reported on Sunday.

Source in Czech: www.idnes.cz

Original news from Dec 16, 2008:
The mayor of Prague, Pavel Bem, is trying to climb on Mount Vinson, the highest mountain of Antarctica, Czech mainstream media iDNES reported today.

The source in Czech: www.idnes.cz

Pavel Bem, who has been a long standing active mountaineer, climbed in May 2007 Mount Everest with a small Slovak-Czech expedition in the Himalayas.

Pavel Bem (44) is serving his second term in office, and is a member of the right wing party ODS. His last successful election campaign (2006) was established on his image as a Politician and a Mountaineer.

He was considered as the second man of the party and potential future Czech Premier, but recently this month he has failed in candidature to be the ODS chairman.

He is originally a physician, and in the 90´s was an expert in the treatment of drug addicts. He climbed e.g. Pik Komunismus (7495 m) in Pamir, Tadjikistan in 1987.