Weekly Review of Events Involving Slovenia from 15 to 21 December

Ljubljana, 22 December - The week kicked off with the official announcement of the expected resignation of Slovenia's Europe Minister Igor Bavcar, who is now set to take up the highest post at the Slovene oil company Istrabenz. European officials in Slovenia and Slovene politicians were quick to assess that the move would not have detrimental effects for Slovenia's bid to finish accession negotiations by 2002. Their statements were confirmed on Friday, when Slovenia closed the transport chapter of the acquis and thus raised the number of chapter closed in accession talks to 26 out of a total of 29, remaining the candidate with the most closed chapters.