NEWS
Prime Minister Janez Janša: Material for the Arbitral Tribunal is well prepared and well-founded"
"After a lengthy period, the Slovenian Parliament, overcoming some minor considerations, adopted by an overwhelming majority a decision on the subject-matter of dispute before the Arbitral Tribunal, which is to determine the border between the Republic of Slovenia and the Republic of Croatia," said the Prime Minister of the Republic of Slovenia, Janez Janša, after the Memorandum to the Arbitration Agreement was confirmed in the National Assembly.
The Prime Minister assessed that "the material for the Arbitral Tribunal is well prepared and professionally well-founded. The considerations and ambiguities regarding a few percent of the text were eliminated in full by today's decisions of the National Assembly." The Prime Minister explained that with the Memorandum and with today's decisions of the National Assembly, Slovenia took full advantage of the room for manoeuvre given by the Arbitration Agreement and adopted the position that promises success in the most vital point of this dispute.
"The decision adopted today removes some ambiguities from the material. It also presents the Slovenian Parliament's interpretation of key points of the Arbitration Agreement," said Prime Minister Janša. He added that "upon the ratification of the Arbitration Agreement, Croatia clearly expressed its interpretation of key points of its text. Slovenia, on the other hand, did that only partly. It made only half a step at the time. The Slovenian Parliament took the other half of that step today. Thus the room for manoeuvre allowed by the Agreement has been used up." The Prime Minister once again refuted press statements that the Government has rejected the Memorandum to the Agreement. He explained that it has considered it only once and proposed only minimum amendments. The amendments, which were adopted this morning by the Parliamentary Committee on Foreign Policy, were adopted on the proposal of the Prime Minister. "The document that the Government has in fact rejected, was the report on the work of groups preparing the material, which has been wrongly interpreted in the public as the Government rejecting the Memorandum. The report was rejected because of mistakes, as there were clear differences between the text and the maps," explained the Prime Minister.
The Memorandum will be submitted to the Arbitral Tribunal in the form it was finally verified by the decisions of the Parliament today. Prime Minister Janša asserted that it will be sent to the Arbitral Tribunal by the deadline, February 11th 2013.