According to the theory of plate tectonics, the Earth crust is composed of 14 to 16 major independent segments - tectonic plates. These plates are in motion relative to one another. Not all the plate boundaries are exactly defined. The paper focuses on the behaviour of tectonic plates in the collision zones. Space geodesy techniques allow us to determine precise positions and velocities of the sites on the Earth surface. The global horizontal motions of the tectonic plates were derived from the coordinates and velocities of the stations defining the International Terrestrial Reference Frame - ITRF 2005 which is based on these techniques. The method described in (Kostelecký and Zeman, 2000) was employed. In the Mediterranean area, which is a contact area between the Eurasian, the Arabian and the African plate, also relative movements of the points located along the plate boundaries were computed. Further, a continuum mechanics approach was applied to detect surface deformations on the European continent and around collision zones between the tectonic plates all over the globe., Miluše Šnajdrová and Jan Kostelecký., and Obsahuje bibliografii