PRAGUE — Milos Zeman, the president of the Czech Republic since 2013, is no stranger to controversy. He once suggested that vegetarians and teetotalers should be put to death — and then added that he was referring to Hitler, who abstained from alcohol and meat. He has referred to news reporters as “manure” and “hyenas.” He has called Islam a “religion of death.”

Mr. Zeman’s latest incendiary remark came on Sunday. In Beijing for an international conference to discuss Beijing’s $1 trillion “One Belt, One Road” plan to shake up the global economic order, Mr. Zeman was chatting with Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, when he appeared to suddenly suggest that journalists be killed.

“And here are other journalists?” Mr. Zeman asked in Russian, as the two presidents walked to a news conference. “There are too many journalists.”

The audio was fuzzy, but Mr. Zeman was clearly heard talking of a “need to liquidate” the journalists.