Dr. Dimitrij Rupel, Slovenian foreign minister, comments yesterday's statement from the federal minister of foreign affairs, Budimir Lončar.

Ljubljana, 23 August - " Tepid reaction by the Yugoslavian diplomacy and by the curtailed federal administration regarding the attempted coup in the Soviet Union, comes as no surprise", stated Dr. Dimitrij Rupel and continued: " There are also enough reasons for serious doubt about the assertion of the Federal Foreign Minister, Budimir Lončar, presented at yesterday's press conference in Belgrade. Budimir Lončar said that, the remnant circles of the Yugoslav federal administration are unanimous about the need for a peaceful resolution to the Yugoslav crisis. It was within these circles that a decision on the attack on Slovenia was also made. Furthermore, the people within this power structure are daily closing their eyes to the civilian and military escalation of violence in Croatia and among them, there are even some who are planning this violence. The attitude of the federal secretariat for foreign affairs concerning the internationalization of the Yugoslav crisis is particularly unacceptable. It can not be explained any other way than that the Yugoslav diplomacy is accepting the international apprehensions as a necessary evil and ignoring the explicit will and decisions of individual republics or their respective leaderships. A question is therefore justified, in whose name speaks the Federal Secretariat? Fortunately, Yugoslav diplomacy is not the only source of information abroad. From the many contacts with foreign ministers and other high officials, it is possible to discern that their understanding of the reasons for Yugoslav crisis and its possible solution, are much deeper and more differentiated", thus, Dr. Rupel ends his statement.