FATE OF ARBITRATION AGREEMENT REMAINS UNCERTAIN
After the Croatian side, prompted by a 26 October visit of Slovenian Prime Minister Borut Pahor, finally launched procedures towards the signing of an arbitration framework agreement on the border with Slovenia, matters got complicated by Croatia's announcement of a unilateral statement.
Targeting the article that says the arbitral tribunal "shall determine Slovenia's junction to the high sea", Croatia stated that "nothing in the arbitration agreement between Croatia and Slovenia shall be understood as Croatia's consent to Slovenia's claim of its territorial contact with the high seas". With Croatia wanting the Swedish EU presidency to act as witness to this statement, Pahor said on 30 October he would not sign the agreement under such an arrangement.
Opposition parties in both countries remain critical of the agreement for reverse reasons. While the Croatian PM still needs to make her case in parliament, she said the signing in Stockholm could already happen on 4 November. After the latest developments Pahor on the other hand spoke of the second part of November.
DESUS DISPUTE ENDS WITH PARTY TURNING BACK ON MP
The tug-of-war between the president of the coalition Pensioners' Party (DeSUS) Karl Erjavec and DeSUS deputy group member Vili Reznik - the latter had criticised Erjavec over the way he went about selecting a new minister - was brought to an end this week with a vote at the DeSUS council.
Faced with Erjavec's resignation threat, DeSUS decided that Rezman, who is not a DeSUS member, would be "denied hospitality" in the future. While DeSUS cannot exclude Rezman from the deputy group, he will no longer be provided with technical assistance from the party and will not be allowed to speak on its behalf. DeSUS deputy group head Franc Znidarsic, who had backed Rezman in his criticism, became more reserved about his future support after the vote.
Rezman labeled his expulsion a big defeat for democracy, but said he would stay with the group as an MP until a law enters into force that prohibits mayors from also serving as MPs and vice-versa. He announced a book that will tell his view of the current and past disputes with Erjavec.
BOMBINGS INCIDENTS SHEDS LIGHT ON WEAPONS THEFT SCANDAL
Eight people sustained injuries, including three grave, as a M75 hand grenade exploded in front of a night club in the city of Kranj early on Sunday. Four men suspected of being involved were arrested the next day as they were trying to cross the border to Croatia.
The incident, which is said to have been caused by a dispute over a woman, acquired new dimensions on Wednesday as police established that the hand grenade detonated was linked to the June theft of arms from a military warehouse near the town of Pivka, SW.
The discovery of bombs from the warehouse in the house of one of the suspects, a 20-year-old, prompted the police to expand the investigation to seven suspects. Discovered eventually was an arsenal including a wooden case of M-75 hand grenades, unknown powder suspected to be cocaine, 123 igniters for hand grenades, 684 rifle grenade cartridges, eight M-80 rocket launchers M-80, eight anti-tank missile launchers, six RPG-22 anti-tank rocket launchers etc. According to the police, the persons from whom weapons were seized had access to the warehouse, and one of them was employed with the Defence Ministry.
SITUATION ESCALATES AT CAR SEAT COVERS MAKER PREVENT
The situation at Prevent Global, the group whose main line of business is car seat covers, escalated on 27 October with a spontaneous one-hour strike of workers, who are concerned about their future in the company, which is plagued by a EUR 60m debt and continuous infighting between the two major owners Janko Zakersnik (52%) and Nijaz Hastor (45%).
After Hastor's German company Prevent DEV, a major customer of Prevent Global, nearly realised on 25 October its threat of withdrawing its production from Slovenia if the company's management and the supervisory board fail to resign, former Prevent Global owner Joze Kozmus stepped in with the proposal to buy off Zakersnik's stake in the company for EUR 5.2m, the exact amount Prevent needs to stave off insolvency.
Zakersnik rejected the offer, demanding EUR 10m and a guarantee that production remains in Slovenia. He accused Hastor and Zakernsik of having caused damage to the company in the past with dubious deals. The workers, the company employs some 1,300 people, meanwhile announced a strike for 19 November if they receive no pay for October by 18 November.
CHRONOLOGY:
SATURDAY, 24 October
LJUBLJANA - Daily Dnevnik reported that severance pay to three sacked management members of Slovenia's largest bank NLB could cost the bank EUR 2.5m.
POSTOJNA - Prime Minister Borut Pahor addressed his Social Democrats (SD), highlighting plans to increase the taxation of luxury.
LJUBLJANA - Some 3,000 people gathered in the centre of Ljubljana to protest against the planned family legislation changes equalising same-sex unions with traditional family.
VIPAVA - President Danilo Tuerk called for national unity as he addressed a ceremony marking the 18th anniversary since the last Yugoslav soldiers left Slovenia.
LJUBLJANA - The indices on the Ljubljana Stock Exchange looked back on the first negative week after two weeks of steady growth,
SUNDAY, 25 October
KRANJ - Eight people sustained injuries when an explosive device was detonated in front of a nightclub in the city of Kranj early in the morning.
MARIBOR - The 44th Borstnik Meeting theatre festival closed. The Borstnik Ring, the country's highest award for lifetime achievement in acting, was conferred on actress Minu Kjuder. The Grand Prix for best production went to "Macbeth po Shakespearu" (Macbeth After Shakespeare) by Ivica Buljan.
LJUBLJANA - Kenyan runners William Biama and Kilel Cheptonui won the men's and women's competition at the 14th Ljubljana Marathon respectively.
MONDAY, 26 October
ZAGREB, Croatia - PM Borut Pahor and his Croatian counterpart Jadranka Kosor met to agree that the two countries were entering the final stage of talks on the draft arbitration agreement for solving the border dispute.
LJUBLJANA - A poll carried by daily Dnevnik showed public support for the government falling to 32.2% since November when it stood at 60.8%.
LJUBLJANA - A survey by published by daily Delo suggested that almost one half of Slovenians oppose the signing of an agreement on border arbitration with Croatia.
LJUBLJANA - Slovenia's second largest bank, NKBM, said it had posted EUR 14.7m in operating profit in the first nine months, which presented slightly more than 40% of the profit the bank posted in the same period last year.
LJUBLJANA - The national motorway company, DARS, signed three state guarantee-backed loan deals worth EUR 147m for funding of the construction of motorway sections in Slovenia.
LJUBLJANA - The Statistics Office said that business sentiment in Slovenia was down in October over the month before. Notably consumer confidence was down by 10 points on a monthly basis.
LJUBLJANA, Slovenia/BRUSSELS, Belgium - Slovenian telecoms regulator APEK agreed with the call of the European Commission to review its broadband market analysis and its distinction between residential and business customers in determining the prices for unbundled fibre access.
LJUBLJANA - A study by the office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) showed Slovenia having the lowest number of asylum seekers in Central Europe and also the lowest percentage of people granted refugee status.
TUESDAY, 27 October
WASHINGTON, US - The US State Department found in its latest religious freedom report that practicing religion in Slovenia is free.
LJUBLJANA - The coalition said after a meeting that it would try to further cut the expenditure in the draft budget for 2010, envisaged to stand at more than EUR 10bn, by at least EUR 35m.
LUXEMBOURG, Luxembourg - Slovenian Foreign Minister Samuel Zbogar assessed Slovenia's chairmanship of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe (CoE) as successful as he attended a regular meeting of representatives of the EU and CoE.
BUSAN, South Korea - President Danilo Tuerk began a two-day visit to South Korea, during which he also met with his South Korean counterpart Lee Myung-bak.
SLOVENJ GRADEC - The uncertain situation at Prevent Global, the group whose main line of business is car seat covers, escalated into a spontaneous workers' strike, which ended after talks with the management.
LJUBLJANA - Slovenia was ranked 20th on the world prosperity scale in a report published by UK-based research institute Legatum has found.
LJUBLJANA - Prime Minister Borut Pahor and Ljubljana Mayor Zoran Jankovic unveiled in Ljubljana a bust of dissident Slovenian politician Stane Kavcic (1919-1987). A book aiming to rehabilitate Kavcic was published the day before.
LJUBLJANA - Moderna galerija director Zdenka Badovinac announced that the Ljubljana-based contemporary arts museum will reopen on 24 November with an exhibition of works by Slovenian modernist painter Zoran Music.
LJUBLJANA - An exhibition opened at the Ljubljana City Museum dedicated to impressionist painter Rihard Jakopic.
LJUBLJANA - Singer Lado Leskovar was selected to receive this year's Jezek Award, given out by public broadcaster RTV Slovenija to promote outstanding achievement in various genres of radio and TV production.
WEDNESDAY, 28 October
LJUBLJANA - Representatives of the government and of public sector trade unions signed after several weeks of negotiations an agreement on changes to the collective bargaining agreement that delay the pay increase promised to the public sector.
LJUBLJANA - PM Borut Pahor said after meeting Chairman of the Council of Ministers of Bosnia-Herzegovina Nikola Spiric that Slovenia and Bosnia-Herzegovina are striving to resolve the issue of the debt to savers of the defunct Slovenian bank LB.
LJUBLJANA - The council of the coalition Pensioners' Party (DeSUS) discussed the falling out between the party's president Karl Erjavec and deputy group member Vili Rezman, siding with the former and deciding to "deny hospitality" to Rezman.
LJUBLJANA - The Economic and Social Council debated the draft budgets for 2010 and 2011, proposing to the government to ease the tax burden on wages and bolster oversight over the payment of taxes and contributions.
PARIS, France - The OECD Trade Committee assessed that Slovenia meets all of the committee's criteria for membership in the organisation.
LJUBLJANA - The Statistics Office said that prices of new apartments dropped by 3.7% in the third quarter of 2009 compared to the previous quarter, and were down for the fourth consecutive quarter. Year-on-year, the prices of new flats were down 17.5%.
THURSDAY, 29 October
ZAGREB, Croatia - Two Croatian dailies published the draft arbitration agreement to resolve the border dispute between Slovenia and Croatia, causing uproar because of an article saying the arbitration tribunal "shall determine Slovenia's junction to the high sea".
BRDO PRI KRANJU - Public debate on proposed changes to the Constitution was launched with an expert panel, bringing much criticism because of plans of expanding the right of the overburdened Constitutional Court to choose which cases to accept.
BELGRADE, Serbia - National Assembly Speaker Pavel Gantar wrapped up a two-day official visit to Serbia by meeting Serbian PM Mirko Cvetkovic.
BRUSSELS - The European Commission decided to take Slovenia and five other EU members to the European Court of Justice over failure to issue industrial permits reducing CO2 emissions.
BRUSSELS, Belgium - PM Borut Pahor met Jan Vanhevel, CEO of the Belgian KBC financial group, the second largest owner of state-owned bank NLB. It is not known whether they also discussed the possibility of a capital increase at NLB.
LJUBLJANA - Slovenia's third largest bank Abanka Vipa, said it had generated EUR 17.9m in net profit in the first nine months, a 20% drop over the same period last year.
LJUBLJANA - The group around retailer Mercator said it had posted a net profit of EUR 17.6m in the first nine months, 51.8% down year-on-year.
LJUBLJANA/LIPICA - The government accepted the resignation of Matjaz Pust as the head of the Lipica stud farm, appointing Tomi Rumpf the acting director.
LJUBLJANA - The Tax Administration (DURS) selected Slovenian subsidiary of global computer giant IBM as the best bidder for the new internal revenue computer system. IBM offered a price of EUR 21.5m to build the system as the only one of three bidders to meet all tender criteria.
FRIDAY, 30 October
BRUSSELS, Belgium - PM Borut Pahor said that in case the Swedish EU presidency acts as witness to Croatia's unilateral statement of non-prejudgement of the draft border arbitration agreement, he will not sign the agreement.
LJUBLJANA - Slovenia was reported recording 0.1% inflation in October over September, and a zero inflation rate at the annual level for the second consecutive month.
BRUSSELS, Belgium - PM Borut Pahor said after the EU summit that emphasis on reduction of greenhouse gas emissions because of sustainable management of forests, which create CO2 sinks, is of key importance for Slovenia in the EU's mandate for the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen in December.
BRUSSELS, Belgium - PM Borut Pahor said that former British Prime Minister Tony Blair has his support as the future president of the European Council.
LJUBLJANA - A national ceremony was held on the eve of Reformation Day.
LJUBLJANA, Slovenia/TRIESTE, Italy - The Standing Committee for Economic Planning and Budget of the Italian Senate was has confirmed the envisaged cuts in funding for the Slovenian minority in Italy for 2010.
BRUSSELS, Belgium - PM Borut Pahor confirmed that there is an ongoing debate between Slovenia and Croatia about the issue of the debt to Croatian savers of the defunct LB bank, but stressed that the issue was unrelated to efforts to solve the border dispute.
LJUBLJANA - Defence Minister Ljubica Jelusic met her Brazilian counterpart Nelson Jobim.
LJUBLJANA - The crisis management of mutual insurance company Vzajemna cancelled an extraordinary assembly called by the Association of Pensioners' Societies (ZDUS) and planned to be held on 6 November.
