The Presidency of the Republic of Slovenia on the Haag conference

Ljubljana, 5 September - The Presidency of the Republic of Slovenia met this afternoon to discuss the guidelines for the Slovenian delegation at the Peace conference on Yugoslavia to be held this Saturday in the Dutch capital Haag. The decision of the Presidency was that the president of the Presidency, Mr. Milan Kučan, the Slovenian member of the Yugoslav presidency, Dr. Janez Drnovšek and the Minister of Exterior, Dr. Dimitrij Rupel, should be the members of the delegation. The baseline for the Slovenian delegation at the negotiations will be set by all the documents relating to the attainment of independence of the Republic of Slovenia as well as new propositions regarding the organization of a Conference on Security and Cooperation in Yugoslavia. It should thus not be possible that the Haag conference would stop the process of separation of Slovenia from Yugoslavia. The Presidency of the Republic of Slovenia ascertained that the proposition of the federal Ministry of exterior relating to the agenda of the Haag conference is not acceptable and will do their best that it be not included into the agenda. The said proposition proceeded from a point of view that the goal of the Conference should be the conservation of Yugoslavia as a union of independent states. The fact, that Serbian aspirations will be presented also by the representatives of the former autonomous republics and even by the representatives of the s.c. SAO Krajina, that Serbia included into its delegation, should not be a cause of worries since all the conclusions of the Conference should be reached on a consensual basis. Since at this point the duration of the Conference is not known in advance, a danger exists of its protraction that would also presume a prolonged economic wearing down of Slovenia, stated the spokesman of the Ministry of Exterior, Mr. No Vajgl. The Slovenian delegation should thus stand firmly from the very start on the baselines for the negotiations and resist possible attempts to change the duration of the moratorium regarding its independence. In order to reach an optimal coordination of the baselines for negotiations the Slovenian delegation will meet a group of international law experts this evening and the representatives of the Slovenians living abroad as well as the representatives of the Italian and Hungarian minority in Slovenia.