Weekly review of events involving Slovenia, 1-7 September

FRIDAY, 1 September

ALPBACH, Austria - President Nataša Pirc Musar set out her views on reform of the UN in an interview with the Austrian news agency APA saying that a country that was discussed on the Security Council or at the UN General Assembly should not have the right to vote or veto. She also believes that an African country should have a permanent seat on the Security Council.

LJUBLJANA - A new school year started for 194,000 primary and 82,000 secondary school students, including for those whose schools were damaged by the summer floods and storms. The early-August floods damaged 12 kindergartens, 19 primary schools and five high schools. Some schools were damaged in July and late-August storms.

LJUBLJANA - The Ministry of Environment, Climate and Energy confirmed for the STA that Slovenia and Hungary were to soon sign a memorandum on a gas pipeline linking the two countries. The investment is to cost Slovenia some EUR 121 million. The pipeline will also be suitable for hydrogen.

LJUBLJANA - The Ministry of the Economy, Tourism and Sport secured EUR 57.1 million in support for 58 tourism infrastructure projects worth EUR 217 million. The support scheme, which primarily targets high-end facilities, will help generate 1,168 new units, Minister Matjaž Han told the press.

LJUBLJANA - The first permanent exhibition in Slovenia dedicated to the Holocaust opened in the Jewish Culture Centre. The exhibition is based on research done for the Stolpersteine (stumbling stones) project in Ljubljana, remembering the Jews who died in the Holocaust.

LJUBLJANA - The Dutch airline KLM Royal Dutch Airlines announced it was testing the Velis Electro aircraft developed by the Slovenian company Pipistrel in a tentative step towards a future of electric passenger aviation.

OKINAWA, Japan/MANILA, the Philippines - Slovenia defeated Australia 91:80 to qualify for the quarter-finals of the Basketball World Cup, but then went on to lose to Germany on 3 September 71:100 to place second in their group. They failed to make it to the semis, having to concede to Canada 89:100 in the quarter-finals on 6 September.

SATURDAY, 2 September

LJUBLJANA - Culture Minister Asta Vrečko was elected the new leader of the Left, replacing Luka Mesec, who had led the party from its inception nearly 10 years ago. Vrečko, who defeated MP Miha Kordiš, the leader of the radical left wing, announced she would focus on consolidating the party on the ground. Mesec will remain a deputy prime minister and labour minister.

VALENCIA, Spain - Primož Roglič, Slovenian Jumbo Visma rider, won stage 8 at the Vuelta to advance five spots to 7th overall. This is Roglič's 78th career stage win, 11 of which at the Vuelta, the Grand Tour that he won in 2019, 2020 and 2021.

SUNDAY, 3 September

ILIRSKA BISTRICA - President Nataša Pirc Musar visited Koseze, a village in southwestern Slovenia hit by a tornado on 1 August, to inspect the repair work. She said the key would be to find a different, sustainable manner of construction and spatial planning in the future.

TINJE - Some hundred locals gathered in the village of Tinje to express opposition to the plans to build three separate wind farms in the hilly area of Pohorje in northeastern Slovenia, one of them affecting their community. The company Energija na Veter, indirectly owned by the Swiss Woc Group, plans to build 56 wind turbines in Pohorje.

MONDAY, 4 September

BRNIK - A delegation of ten US congressmen completed a multi-day visit to Slovenia, with senators Bob Menendez and Lindsey Graham applauding Slovenia for taking "the right side of history" over the war in Ukraine. The delegation met PM Robert Golob and President Nataša Pirc Musar.

LJUBLJANA - Slovenia issued its first inflation-indexed bond. Worth EUR 100 million, the bond has a real coupon of 0.825% and matures in 2034. The bond was listed on the Ljubljana and Luxembourg stock exchanges.

LJUBLJANA - Following record figures in June, Slovenia's external goods trade decreased in July. Exports were down 5% over July 2022 to EUR 4.4 billion, while imports dropped by 19.1% over a year ago, to EUR 3.8 billion, the Statistics Office said.

LJUBLJANA - Visiting the UKC Ljubljana medical centre, President Nataša Pirc Musar and Health Ministry State Secretary Marjan Pintar said the healthcare reform was not going to be completed in this government term.

GLOBASNITZ, Austria - Minister for Slovenians Abroad Matej Arčon visited the bilingual municipalities in the Austrian state of Carinthia that were recently hit by floods, and the municipalities that helped Slovenia in the flood relief effort. He said the floods were an opportunity to improve cooperation between Slovenia and Carinthia in natural disaster relief.

LJUBLJANA - The state-owned company managing the investment in the new railway line between the port of Koper and Divača signed a EUR 203.8 million contract for the finishing work to ensure the safe operation of the line. 2TDK signed the contract with SŽ-Železniško Gradbeno Podjetje, Kolektor IGIN, GH Holding and YM Construction.

NAZARJE - Home appliances maker BSH Hišni Aparati reopened two production lines after being hit hard in the August floods. The management expects production will return to pre-floods levels in the first quarter of 2024.

TUESDAY, 5 September

LJUBLJANA - The Finance Ministry presented details of the planned new bank tax after Prime Minister Robert Golob announced it in televised interviews the night before. The tax is meant as a temporary measure to help finance post-flood reconstruction over the next 5 years and would be levied on 0.2% of the banks' total assets with Finance Minister Klemen Boštjančič saying voluntary contributions to the Reconstruction Fund would be deducted and position of individual banks would be taken into account.

LJUBLJANA - Tomaž Smrekar, director-general of the Statistics Office, denied the allegation by some media that their calculations had been swayed by the government after the office downgraded the GDP growth estimate for 2022 from 5.4% in February to 2.5% on 31 August. He said the review was based on new, aggregate annual data, which had not been available when the original estimate was made. Finance Minister Klemen Boštjančič said they would have to explain to investors how "this difference came about".

MISLINJA - The Ministry of the Economy, Tourism and Sport announced it had received 777 applications from businesses who would like to receive an advance payment of compensation for damage done by the recent floods. The claims exceeded EUR 350 million.

NAZARJE - The Slovenian and Croatian defence ministers, Marjan Šarec and Mario Banožić, visited Lačja Vas near Nazarje, where Croatian troops were building a temporary bridge over the Dreta to replace the one destroyed by the floods a month ago.

WOLFSBURG, Germany - Having been forced to stop production in one facility and reduce production in another two due to a shortage of components made by its Slovenian supplier KLS Ljubno, which was affected by the August floods, the Volkswagen Group said it wanted to keep KLS Ljubno as a supplier, and sent some 130 workers to Slovenia to help in the clean-up effort.

LJUBLJANA - The Slovenian Business Club and its members signed a public pledge to zero tolerance toward bribing of public servants as the club has been working with the Commission for the Prevention of Corruption against corruption in deals between the state and the corporate sector.

LJUBLJANA - The Employment Service saw the registered unemployment total rise by 0.2% in August compared to July to 47,383, but fall by 12.1% year-on-year.

LJUBLJANA - Slovenian researcher Lea Rems won a EUR 1.5 million grant from the European Research Council for Reincarnation, a five-year project looking into the potential of electroporation in heart therapy.

TREBNJE - It transpired that a 16-year-old maltreated elderly residents of a care home in Trebnje while working there during school holidays before posting videos of her actions on Tik Tok. The incident was condemned by PM Robert Golob, Minister for Solidarity-Based Future Simon Maljevac and Human Rights Ombudsman Peter Svetina, among others.

KOPER - The Koper Police Department said that a border police officer was injured by a migrant the past weekend as a police patrol were escorting three migrants in order to check their identities. The migrants were handed to the Croatian law enforcement authorities. The police said such incidents were very rare.

KRŠKO - The Valvasor Library in Krško was shortlisted for the Public Library of the Year Award given out at the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions World Library and Information Congress 2023. The Krško library was one of the four finalists alongside public libraries in Sydney, Shanghai and Barcelona. The Gabriel Garcia Marquez library in Barcelona was named library of the year.

WEDNESDAY, 6 September

LJUBLJANA - National Assembly President Urška Klakočar Zupančič hosted her Croatian counterpart Gordan Jandroković for a visit with the pair expressing satisfaction over the cooperation of their countries and underlining the importance of parliamentary diplomacy. Jandroković discussed bilateral relations and the situation in the Western Balkans with PM Robert Golob.

BUCHAREST, Romania - President Nataša Pirc Musar attended a summit of the Three Seas Initiative, stressing the importance of solidarity and strengthening cooperation and connectivity between countries for sustainable development and security.

MEŽICA - Cablex-M, a company producing, marketing and servicing electrical products, has suffered an estimated flood damage of over EUR 12 million. The company, which employs 340 people, is to be fully operational again by the end of the month.

THURSDAY, 7 September

BRUSSELS, Belgium - Slovenia plans to channel a portion of cohesion policy funds towards post-flood reconstruction and will adjust its national cohesion programme by the end of the year, Regional Development Minister Aleksander Jevšek said after talks with EU Commissioner for Cohesion and Reforms Elisa Ferreira.

LJUBLJANA - PM Robert Golob urged European Council President Charles Michel and EU heads of state to be more ambitious when it comes to the EU accession of Bosnia-Herzegovina, saying that the Council "should decide on opening accession negotiations ... by the end of this year".

LJUBLJANA - After its climate diplomacy envoy Smiljana Knez attended the Africa Climate Summit in Nairobi, Kenya, from 4 to 6 September, the Foreign Ministry said that as an EU member, Slovenia wanted to be a partner to African countries in efforts to mitigate the effects of climate change and to adjust to it faster.

LJUBLJANA - President of the Croatian Parliament Gordan Jandroković met members of the Croatian community during a two-day visit to Slovenia, announcing that Croatia would seek for the community to be given status of a minority as one of the bilateral issues that Croatia would like to resolve in the spirit of good neighbourly relations.

LJUBLJANA - Defence Minister Marjan Šarec revealed that the ministry asked Finland, Poland, Romania and Italy to send final offers after a preliminary round of inquiries for the supply of eight-wheeled armoured personnel carriers for the Slovenian army. The US was part of the preliminary inquiry but was not asked to send a final offer, he said.

LJUBLJANA - Senad Jušić was appointed police commissioner for a full term, after serving in the acting capacity since 24 February to succeed Boštjan Lindav, who also applied for the job this time. Interior Minister Boštjan Poklukar first appointed Jušić just days after assuming office to replace Tatjana Bobnar, who stepped down after a row with PM Robert Golob over Lindav.

STRASBOURG, France - Having examined the sentencing of former Istrabenz executive Igor Bavčar to five years in prison over money laundering in 2016, the ECHR found a violation of the right to presumption of innocence but no violation of the principle of no punishment without law. It ordered Slovenia to pay Bavčar, the country's first interior minister, EUR 16,000.

MARIBOR - The first liquid hydrogen-powered four-seater in the world, developed by the German company H2Fly in cooperation with the Slovenian aircraft maker Pipistrel and the French industrial gas supplier Air Liquide, made its maiden flight at Maribor airport in what is considered a major milestone in zero-emission aviation.

LJUBLJANA - The state-owned power group HSE repaid EUR 142 million of the EUR 492 million it received as recapitalisation in December 2022. This comes three months after HSE repaid the first EUR 100 million.