STA, 18 December 2020 - In the past seven days, the police dealt with almost 16,800 cases monitoring compliance with Covid rules. A total of 1,026 warnings were given, up by some 14% on the week before, and 519 fines were issued, down by 4%, deputy Police Commissioner Tomaž Pečjak said on Friday.
The police conducted 2,400 inspections per day on average to monitor compliance with coronavirus restrictions.
Mostly they dealt with violations of border restrictions, movement restrictions, including those restricting movement between municipalities, the 9pm-6am curfew or a ban on gatherings, Pečjak said at today's government briefing.
The police reported nine violations to the Health Inspectorate in the past seven days. Another 188 alleged violations were reported by municipality residents.
Health inspectors issued 35 sanctions between 7 and 13 December, 265 warnings and 100 administrative measures, having dealt with 2,303 cases, Deana Potza with the inspectorate told the briefing.
Violations include gatherings in the vicinity of food or beverage pick-up points or people wearing face masks wrong or not wearing them at all.
Most police warnings were issued by the Ljubljana Police Department (442), followed by the authorities in the Kranj area (81) and the Koper area (65), Pečjak pointed out.
When it comes to fines, the highest number was also issued in the Ljubljana area (154), followed by the Novo Mesto Police Department (149).
Pečjak said that the police were monitoring compliance with the curfew in cities and on major roads. However, most alleged violations are brought to the attention of the police by residents, he added.
The police issued 1,661 quarantine orders at border crossings between 11 and 17 December, an almost 19% increase on the week before. Most were issued on the border with Croatia (1,032), followed by those issued on the border with Austria (425), Italy (55) and Hungary (16).
At Ljubljana airport the police issued 133 quarantine orders in the past seven days.
The greatest number of quarantine orders was issued to passengers arriving from Bosnia-Herzegovina (437), which compares to 602 orders issued to arrivals from this country in the previous seven days.
A total of 287 quarantine orders was issued to arrivals from Germany, whereas a week before none, followed by arrivals from Croatia (209), Serbia (126), Kosovo (108) and North Macedonia (105).
The number of arrivals entering or exiting Slovenia on the border with Croatia increased by some 10% to 314,266 in the past seven days.
Compared with the same period last year, traffic on the border was reduced by two thirds, Pečjak said.
He urged those who intend to travel to learn about relevant conditions and heed prevention measures consistently, warning that a number of countries had made their entry requirements stricter.
The deputy police commissioner also announced that the police would step up their monitoring this weekend as well.
He added that if an individual wanted to invoke the contact tracing app #OstaniZdrav (#StayWell) as an exemption from the general ban on travel between municipalities, all they had to do was voluntarily show that the app had been installed on their phones.
In the event of an entire family travelling, it is sufficient if only one member claims this exemption, he said, highlighting that the app opened doors only to travel between the municipalities of the same region and only in the four regions with the best epidemiological status.
Tying unrestricted travel between municipalities to the use of the app has raised concern over privacy protection and discrimination of those who do not own a smart phone or a phone that could accommodate such an app, particularly the elderly and vulnerable groups.
