STA, 29 November 2021 - The Slovenian Press Agency (STA) is one of the 16 European press agencies that will join forces in a common European press centre whose creation was announced on Monday by the European Commission in a bid to strengthen the European media space. The pan-European Newsroom will be supported with EU funds.

This will be "the first ever pan-European newsroom space, which will allow journalists to report jointly on EU affairs and promote, let's say, a spirit of collaboration", European Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton said as he announced the new project at an event in Brussels on Monday.

The Commission will support the project with around EUR 1.76 million, which will be used, among other things, to finance training and set up a new multilingual website with selected texts on EU topics from participating news agencies, said the Commission.

The project is due to start in January, while the Newsroom is expected to become operational in mid-2022.

The STA's acting director Igor Kadunc welcomed the project. "We are pleased that the European Commission has recognised the importance of news agencies in providing and disseminating credible information in Europe and the world, and we are proud that the STA is participating in this project," he commented.

The project will be coordinated by the German news agency dpa. The other participating agencies are also AFP (France), ansa (Italy), AGERPRES (Romania), APA (Austria), ATA (Albania), Belga (Belgium), BTA (Bulgaria), HINA (Croatia), EFE and Europapress (Spain), TASR (Slovakia), FENA (Bosnia-Herzegovina), MIA (North Macedonia) and Tanjug (Serbia).

STA, 24 November 2021 - The College of the European Public Prosecutor's Office (EPPO) appointed on Wednesday Tanja Frank Eler and Matej Oštir as Slovenia's European delegated prosecutors for five-year terms, same as all the other delegated prosecutors, in a move welcomed by the prosecutors and the EU Commission.

"We are extremely pleased to have been appointed European delegated prosecutors for a full five-year term and therefore given an opportunity to take part in this project," Frank Eler and Oštir told the STA.

"We thank the European Public Prosecutor's Office for the trust it has shown us. Regardless of all complications in the appointment procedure we would, above all, like to focus on further work in the prosecution of crime against the EU budget," they added.

Slovenia's Supreme State Prosecutor's Office welcomed the EPPO's decision as well, reiterating its stance that the pair were good candidates who had met all the conditions to be appointed European delegated prosecutor.

The decision has ended "delays in the fulfilment of Slovenia's agreed obligations," the Supreme State Prosecutor's Office said, noting that with Frank Eler and Oštir's appointments, Slovenia would finally fill in the gap that had beset the EPPO and "join the common efforts to protect the EU's financial interests in the country".

European Commission Vice-President for Values and Transparency Vera Jourova congratulated Frank Eler and Oštir on their appointments, posting on Twitter: "Good news, now we have Delegated Prosecutors from every participating country."

Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders shared the sentiment, saying: "After several exchanges I had with the Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Janša and the Minister of Justice Marjan Dikaučič, I am happy that we now have delegated prosecutors in all member states participating in the EPPO."

The EPPO received the Slovenian government's proposal to appoint the two candidates on Friday after the government decided last Thursday to refer the State Prosecution Council's pick of Frank Eler and Oštir.

According to the government, the decision is temporary, in place only until the appointment procedure in Slovenia is completed, a stance that has been disputed by experts.

The government argued that it had taken note of the procedure so far and established that it had not been carried out in line with the state prosecution act due to an insufficient number of applications.

The decision to nominate the selected candidates on a temporary basis has been thus made to avert substantial damage to Slovenia that could be caused by the delay in the appointment, the government said.

However, following the assessment of Frank Eler and Oštir, the EPPO decided this morning to appoint them as full-fledged delegated prosecutors, each for a period of five years, same as delegated prosecutors from all the other EU countries participating in the EPPO.

This comes after the office highlighted on Monday that national authorities only proposed the candidates, but it was up to the EPPO's College to decide on their appointment. "This is key to our independence," the EPPO said.

The State Prosecution Council said that the appointments of Frank Eler and Oštir for a full five-year term "mean the confirmation of the legality of the council's proposal".

However, Janša said today that "nothing is happening that has not been agreed on". "If there is anything left that is unclear, it will be cleared up in the next months," he said at a press conference he held with the Polish prime minister today.

Justice Minister Marjan Dikaučič told Radio Slovenija that Slovenia had been all along striving to fully join the EPPO's efforts as soon as possible by appointing European delegated prosecutors. "Today's decision settled that," the minister said.

The office was launched in June to investigate and prosecute EU budget fraud and other crimes against the bloc's financial interests. A total of 22 member states take part in the EPPO, including Slovenia, which was the last country to propose its delegated prosecutors.

STA, 28 October 2021 - Slovenia has ranked 12th in this year's EU gender equality index ranking released by the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE) on Thursday. The country scored 67.6 points out of 100, practically level with the EU average, as it dropped by one spot compared to the 2020 ranking.

The EU average is 68 points, a tiny improvement on 2020, but given the institute's estimates, the consequences of the pandemic could bring all this progress to nothing in the future, said the Ministry of Labour, Family, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities.

The list is topped by Sweden with 83.9 points, which had the best score last year as well, whereas Greece has come last with 52.5 points. Slovenia is meanwhile tucked in between Austria (68 points) and Malta (65 points).

"Since 2010, Slovenia's score has increased by 4.9 points but its ranking has dropped by three places. Since 2018, Slovenia's score has remained the same (-0.1 points), but its ranking dropped by two places," the EIGE noted.

The ranking is determined based on six main categories: work, money, knowledge, time, power and health, and a cross-sectional issue of violence.

When it comes to work, Slovenia scored 73 points, down by 0.1 point on 2020 due to increased gender segregation in employment. Since 2010, Slovenia's ranking in this category has dropped from the 10th to the 15th place.

In the money category, which includes average net income and at-risk-of-poverty rate, the country got 83.7 points, up by 0.7 point. This score and ranking are among the highest for the country as it placed 12th among all member states.

The same improvement was recorded in knowledge, where Slovenia bagged 56.6 points. However, Slovenia's gender inequalities remain most pronounced in this category as the country ranked 18th in the knowledge domain, its lowest ranking.

When it comes to the time category or allocation of time spent doing care and domestic work and social activities, the country got 72.9 points, same as last year.

In the power category, where gender representation in government and parliament is taken into account, Slovenia received the least points, 53, down by two points on last year as a result of a lower number of female ministers in the current government.

Since 2010, the share of women on the boards of the largest listed companies has increased from 10% to 24%, while the share of women on the central bank board has remained at 20%.

Taking into account the last decade, Slovenia's score has improved the most in the domain of power as it increased by 11.9 points. However, since other countries have seen faster progress, Slovenia's ranking has still decreased by four spots, taking the 13th place.

Health-wise, Slovenia has fared the best, having scored 87.8 points, up by 0.9 of a point. Female participants in the survey were more likely to consider their health worse than men's even though their life expectancy is higher by six years in general.

Healthy life expectancy after the age of 65 is the same for both women and men in the country, and the level of fitness is much above EU average for both men and women.

On the other hand, one of the largest gender gaps in the EU is Slovenia's situation when it comes to paying for unexpected costs of primary healthcare services, as some 47% of women in the country have difficulties with this, while the same problem is encountered by 40% of men.

This is also one of the largest gender divides across the bloc compared to EU average, which stands at 19% and 17%, respectively.

The violence sub-index did not provide an assessment of progress for 2021 due to the lack of comparable data for all EU countries. Eurostat is currently coordinating a survey on gender-based violence in the EU, the results of which will be included in the 2024 index, the ministry said.

Read the full report here

STA, 21 October 2021 - Slovenia and four other EU countries have drawn up a proposal to transform the EU's existing battle groups into a rapid reaction force in an initiative prompted by the experience of troop withdrawal from Afghanistan where the EU had to rely on the US, the Germany press agency dpa has reported.

The report says the concept proposed by Slovenia, Germany, Finland, the Netherlands and Portugal is to create effective forces capable of responding to crises at short notice. Along with special forces and air transport they would also include space and cyber capabilities.

"Recent events in Afghanistan have shown once more that the EU has to be in a position ... to act robustly and rapidly," reads the document compiled by the five countries and obtained by the dpa.

To provide greater flexibility, the five countries propose invoking Article 44 of the EU Treaty, which talks of intervention by a "coalition of the willing" and which has never been activated. The countries also propose using regional cooperation arrangements already in place to greater effect.

While not specifying what size the reaction force should be, the document says the land-based forces should be of brigade strength, which means around 5,000 troops.

The current battle group concept provides for two 1,500-strong units to be on standby but currently only one such unit is available and the force has never been in fact deployed.

The five countries hope to have the document included in the Strategic Compass - a key European defence and security process aimed at enhancing the EU's strategic autonomy.

Answering a query from the STA, the Defence Ministry confirmed that Slovenian had participated in drawing up the proposal from the field of crisis management.

"It is just another segment in the mosaic of thought papers and discussions with which EU members make efforts for the Strategic Compass to give concrete political guidelines for further development of the common security and defence policy in the coming five to ten years," it said in a written statement.

EU members' efforts are directed towards using and upgrading the existing EU structures and elements to make them more operational, the ministry said, adding the proposal received broad support at today's discussion of EU defence ministers in Brussels with more countries announcing to join it.

STA, 14 October - Prime Minister Janez Janša has faced heavy criticism after publishing a tweet implying that many members of the European Parliament are "Soros puppets", including Sophie in 't Veld, the chair of a fact-finding mission currently examining Slovenia's compliance with rule of law and media freedom covenants.

"We urgently call on Janša to cease the provocations against members of the European Parliament. Attacks on members of this house are also attacks on European citizens," European Parliament President David Sassoli said on Twitter.

"A constructive collaboration with the rotating Council Presidency can only be based on mutual trust and respect," he said.

The statement came after Janša tweeted an image with the heading "13 of the 226 known Soros puppets in the EU parliament", a reference to Hungarian billionaire George Soros.

Janša, who has often accused political opponents of being on Soros's payroll, has since deleted the tweet.

The image he tweeted has been traced by Twitter sleuths to a radical hate blog. Some of the people in the image are no longer MEPs and one passed away earlier this year.

Some accused Janša of anti-Semitism, including the Dutch MEP Malik Azmani, who described the image as a "despicable, anti-Semitic trope", and vice-president of Renew Europe, and German Green MEP Daniel Freund, who said Janša "peddles Orban-style anti-Semitic conspiracy theories".

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte described Janša's tweet as "tasteless" and condemned it "in the strongest possible terms". "The government just conveyed this same sentiment to the Slovenian ambassador in The Hague," he said.

Janša retorted that Rutte should not "waste time with ambassadors and media freedom in Slovenia. Together with @SophieintVeld, protect your journalists from being killed on the streets."

This was just one of the tweets referencing the fact-finding mission in recent days.

This afternoon, he responded to a tweet by the European Socialists and Democrats, who said Janša refused to meet with the European Parliament's fact-finding mission.

"Who are you? How many times have you visited a German chancellor, a Dutch PM or a French president?" Janša said.

"By the way, it's Netherlands where the last journalist was killed in the #EU. In Slovenia, such attempts were executed only during the regime of your comrades" from the ranks of the Social Democrats (SD), he said.

SD president Tanja Fajon, herself an MEP, said she felt ashamed. "I hope my colleagues understand Slovenia is much more than Janez Janša."

Slovenian Renew MEP Irena Joveva described Janša's tweets as "vile provocations" and in a joint statement with fellow Renew MEP Klemen Grošelj rejected the "anti-Semitic message in the prime minister's post".

MEP Milan Zver, a member of Janša's Democrats (SDS), meanwhile hit back at Sassoli saying his statement was "politically motivated and indicates ignorance of the situation in Slovenia."

STA, 12 October - Ten EU countries, Slovenia included, have asked the EU Commission to recognise nuclear power as a low-carbon energy source that should be part of the Union's transition towards climate neutrality and help reduce the bloc's energy dependence.

The ten countries say nuclear is a "key affordable, stable and independent energy source" that could protect EU consumers from being "exposed to the volatility of prices," Euronews has reported.

"While renewable energy sources play a key role for our energy transition, they cannot produce enough low-carbon electricity to meet our needs, at a sufficient and a constant level," the letter says.

The signatories also highlight nuclear as a way of improving the bloc's energy independence. "The rise of energy prices have also shown how important is it to reduce our energy dependence on third countries as fast as possible," reads the letter.

Commenting on the letter, Slovenian Infrastructure Minister Jernej Vrtovec wrote on Twitter that nuclear energy was "crucial for energy independence. More and more countries now realise that."

Slovenia's sole nuclear power station in Krško accounted for 45% of all energy produced in Slovenia last year. Plans have already been set in motion to replace the ageing reactor with a new unit.

Commenting on the matter during a visit with Slovenian automotive suppliers in Idrija, Prime Minister Janez Janša said it would be impossible to provide sufficient supply of the population or achieve carbon-free society by 2050 without increasing production at nuclear power plants in Europe.

The countries that will not opt for nuclear energy for one reason or another will have to abandon their reservations about those who will or else the formula will not work out, said Janša.

He noted that nuclear energy is a political issue and one involving prejudice because of disasters such as the one in Chernobyl in 1986. "However, it's necessary to realise that since Chernobyl the technology has become more advanced and safety mechanisms have become much better."

Janša agrees that nuclear plants are not fully sustainable due to the problems of fuel and waste, but he said "all that is solvable".

"Either we opt for nuclear energy or we burn candles, a consideration will have to be made what poses a greater risk to the civilisation," said Janša.

STA, 7 October 2021 - Prime Minister Janez Janša has accused the European Commission of exceeding its powers and of political abuse of the rule of law in an interview with Euronews, saying in its efforts to get member states to comply with the EU's fundamental values the Commission is "close to breaking the rule of law" itself.

"We have the UN Charter of Human Rights. We have a European charter of human rights, but in political language, especially in the European Parliament, everyone can add to this list whatever he or she wants. So it's politically abused term and used for political battle," Janša said in the interview on the sidelines of the EU-Western Balkans summit at Brdo.

He said that while the European Parliament is a political body, the European Commission should under the EU treaty stay out of political battles. This had been the case until the Commission was led by Jean-Claude Juncker, but it changed as Ursula von der Leyen took over, he said, adding: "I think this is close to breaking the rule of law because the Commission has to be an honest broker."

Janša also took aim at Commission Vice-President Vera Jourova, who alongside Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders, has become the most public face of the Commission's effort to ensure compliance with the rule of law.

He accused Jourova of "issuing statements which are a clear violation of the treaty. But she's supported by the European press. So she is continuing with this. If this would have happened 15 years ago, I think she wouldn't stay as a member of the Commission for one week. At that time, the rules were clear," Janša said.

Commenting on the EU's relations with Western Balkan Countries, Janša noted that the EU is not the only investor in the region, but has competitors such as China, Russia and Turkey.

While they are not setting conditions for investment, the EU does, Janša said, listing European standards, rule of law reforms. Such conditioning "is OK, if there is a light at the end of the tunnel".

"There is one big advantage on our side: the EU membership [...] But if this perspective is not real, then we are losing momentum and we are at a crucial moment."

Discussing the EU's strategic autonomy and its global role, Janša argued for continued partnership with the US, including within NATO, but also said that NATO and the US "will not solve the problems and conflicts in our backyard, in our neighbourhood," that is the Western Balkans, the Mediterranean and Africa.

He believes the bloc should be more focused on securing its own external borders instead of "sending money and humanitarian aid, which is then finishing in the hands of the terrorists or the warlords".

About Afghanistan he said: "Our obligation is to help those who helped us", but added that "there is no place in Europe for 10 million Afghanistan people," and asserting that the EU "will not repeat the mistake some member countries made in 2015".

STA, 5 October 2021 - Interior Minister Aleš Hojs called for better control over who enters the EU as he took part in a meeting of the home affairs ministers of the Visegrad Group plus Austria and Slovenia in Budapest on Tuesday. He said securing EU borders should remain top priority.

The meeting, featuring officials from the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia, as well as Austria and Slovenia, focused on current challenges in migration and management of EU borders.

"Protecting the EU's external borders must remain our absolute priority, to tackle security risks and prevent potential migration pressures. We must not allow a repeat of the 2015 scenario so we must refrain from statements that could represent a pull factor," Hojs said as quoted in a press release from his ministry.

He urged a united approach to external dimensions of migration. "The European Commission must, in cooperation with us, the member states, establish close cooperation with third countries. This cooperation should be based on the principle of mutual benefit."

As a representative of the EU presiding country, Hojs presented the contents of the next session of the EU Justice and Home Affairs Council, in particular further debate on the new pact on migration and asylum.

He argued that the EURODAC regulation, which deals with the EU's asylum and migrant fingerprint database, should be debated as a matter of priority in order to implement interoperability as soon as possible and to improve migration and asylum management, in particular in the field of returning of migrants.

The Hungarian MTI agency reported Hungarian Foreign Minister Sandor Pinter said the ministers were in complete agreement that the EU's external borders needed to be protected. He added that the challenge of migration as a result of the situation in Afghanistan would apply to all European countries in the future.

According to the Interior Ministry, Hojs thanked his counterparts for a constructive approach in adopting in a joint statement on the situation Afghanistan at the August meeting of home affairs ministers in Brussels, adding that it should be followed up by implementation.

The statement said the EU was determined to prevent uncontrolled influx of migrants from Afghanistan and that any encouragement to illegal migration should be avoided. The ministers also supported enhancing support to third countries hosting large numbers of migrants and refugees. They committed for the EU and member states to do everything to prevent the situation in Afghanistan to lead to new security threats to EU citizens.

STA, 6 October 2021 - The EU must strengthen its capacity to act autonomously in order to become more effective and assertive on the international stage, EU leaders agreed at last nights’ informal dinner according to a statement by Council President Charles Michel.

"Our unity is our core asset. By acting together, we will leverage our strengths," Michel said was one of the main messages of the debate.

In this sense, the EU is "committed to consolidating our strengths and strengthening our resilience by reducing our critical dependencies."

The first meeting since June, the gathering saw the leaders address the fallout from the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan and the formation of the AUKUS alliance between the US, UK and Australia.

Happy to attend the @EU2021SI Presidency informal dinner of EU 27 leaders this evening.

The EU faces a challenging global environment.

I look forward to discussing how we can maintain strong partnerships and strengthen our position on the international stage. pic.twitter.com/xwRpMRdzzv

— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) October 5, 2021

Michel said the bloc remained "committed to working with our allies and like-minded partners, in particular the US and within NATO which is the cornerstone of our security."

As for ties with China, he said the EU would "pursue our own interests" and considered China "a competitor, a partner and a systemic rival".

The office of the Slovenian prime minister said the leaders conducted a "strategic debate" on the EU's role in the international arena against the backdrop of recent events in Afghanistan, a debate on the AUKUS security partnership, and relations with China.

It said relations with strategic partners needed to become "a key component of a strong foreign policy".

"The EU's goals in this field have not changed, but due to the recent events it is necessary to think about the best way to achieve them."

STA, 5 October 2021 - Slovenia has failed to satisfactorily implement or address any of the 15 recommendations the Group of States against Corruption (GRECO) made in its 2018 evaluation report. The country has partly implemented only one recommendation, the Council of Europe's (CoE) anti-corruption body says in its latest compliance report on Slovenia.

The recommendations from the fifth-round evaluation report, released 8 March 2018, concerned the prevention of corruption and encouragement of integrity in top government officials and law enforcement agencies.

GRECO now says that Slovenia has made very limited progress concerning top government officials as it has only made some efforts to raise awareness about integrity, while not introducing any internal mechanism to encourage awareness-raising.

The country has meanwhile failed to address a number of other issues - increasing staff and funds, improving a procedure of the national Commission for the Prevention of Corruption (KPK), tightening lobbying and employment rules for when an official's employment terminates, expanding the need to declare assets to include family members, adopting an umbrella integrity plan for the public administration or organisational strategies to address the conflict of interests.

It has neither made any progress in the timely publication of declared assets of ministers and state secretaries, substantive checking of these assets, or violations regarding assets declaration.

The country's efforts in the field of the police have also been rather limited, says the report Greco adopted at the end of October 2020 but only released on Tuesday.

Despite introducing some legal changes to police organisation and work to better manage corruption risks, no tangible results have been achieved.

There has also been no progress in ensuring that promotion and dismissal procedures in the police are fair, merit-based and transparent.

GRECO, however, noticed some positive steps towards encouraging women to join the police force and employing them in it.

The evaluation report thus concludes that progress is needed for Slovenia to show an acceptable level of compliance with the recommendations in the coming 18 months, and urges Slovenia to draft a second report on the situation to include the potential progress by 30 April 2022.

Transparency International (TI) Slovenia is not surprised by the findings, arguing that fighting corruption is not a priority of decision-makers, which the report only corroborates.

"Although these findings are almost a year old, and there has been some progress later on, which the report does not cover, the general impression from the past few years is that the fight against corruption is at the bottom of the list of priorities of decision-makers," the NGO wrote in a response for the STA.

TI would like to see not only a more comprehensive reform of legislation but also more preventive activities to strengthen oversight institutions and the civil society, where the trend is negative, "since the society's ability to fight against corruption is decreasing with the attacks on journalists, NGOs and media".

The Commission for the Prevention of Corruption said it expected that the authorities would take a more active approach in implementing the recommendations.

Despite the numerous examples of best practice in this field implemented by individuals bodies and organisations within the public sector, there has been (almost) no progress in implementing these recommendations, it added.

"This progress is even more important in the current circumstances, when new corruption risks related to the anti-epidemic measures taken by the government are being detected, and when the trust of public in the most senior public office holders attaining ethical standards is low."

A PDF of the full report, in English