Realization of Brioni Declaration

Ljubljana, 15 August - Following the meeting of Slovenian government, at which the questions were discused regarding how the Brioni Declaration is being realized, their representatives reported the conclusions of todays session at a news conference. In his introduction , the minister of information, Mr. Jelko Kancin said that during the moratorium period, the Slovenian economy is not immune towards the one-sided decisions of the federal government and that therefore, certain retaliatory actions must be prepared. The vice-president of the Slovenian Executive Council, Mr. Andrej Ocvirk said that the federal government is making an assertion that the Slovenian government is not upholding the Brioni Declaration. It is a matter of essential questions regarding the financial-monetary politics, import duties and the openness of air space. In spite of the Slovenian argument that it is not violating the Yugoslav National Bank's decrees and that it is operating according to Yugoslav regulations, the NBY's board of governors have never the less not renounced its decree, which excludes the Slovenian National Bank from the Yugoslav monetary system. Dr. Franc Arhar from the SNB, stated that the supervisors from the NBY have themselves found that Slovenia abides by the regulations and added that Slovenia will be forced to introduce special value coupons into the money circulation if the decision is not revoked, with which Ante Marković also agrees. There are still many open questions regarding import duties. The Slovenian government stands firm on its position that the Customs Office is in the republican jurisdiction, using the federal regulations during the moratorium period. Consequently, they have proposed an agreement on cooperation between Slovenia and the federal government, regarding the collection of import duties and other border controls. The Slovenian government suggests that a separate account be set up, to which collected import duties will be credited to and which shall be open to inspection regarding the way the assets will be used. However, the federal government has not yet given its assent to this proposal. The representative from the Ministry of Transport and Communication, Mr. Slavko Hanžel stated that the opening of the air traffic is proceeding very slowly and that Slovenian air space is still not completely open to general aviation. This indicates that the federal government is violating the Brioni Declaration, which is causing a great economic damage to Slovenia but that there must no doubt also exist other ulterior motives for this.