STA, 4 April 2018 - The parliamentary Foreign Policy Committee failed to make a decision on Wednesday on an initiative to recognise Palestine, with chair Jožef Horvat arguing there was no legal basis for this as the government has not taken a clear position on the issue. This does not necessarily mean that the motion has hit a dead end yet.
The committee was expected to decide on the motion filed by the opposition Left before it is discussed by the National Assembly at an extraordinary session on Friday, but no decision was taken today.
As the emergency session requires the opinion of the relevant committee, it is possible, in line with the parliamentary rules of procedure, that the Foreign Policy Committee holds another session on the topic before Friday.
In line with the rules of procedure, a session can be called by the parliamentary speaker on a proposal from a committee member, if it is not called by the committee chair. Such session is then chaired by the most senior vice-chair of the committee.
If Jožef Horvat of the opposition New Slovenia (NSi), who proposed today that the committee concludes that there is no legal basis to decide on the motion, does not call another session before Friday, it could be called by Speaker Milan Brglez and chaired by Julijana Bizjak Mlakar of the coalition Pensioners' Party (DeSUS).
Horvat's proposal was endorsed by ten MPs against six.
There was actually no discussion today, with Horvat only summarising the debates that took place at the committee, which has been dealing with the issue since the Left filed the motion in June 2015.
Matej T. Vatovec of the Left meanwhile called on fellow committee members to support the motion and make the "right and just decision" and be "principled".
A representative of the parliament's legal service said that under the law, a motion to recognise Palestine needs to be submitted by the government, which has failed to do so before the resignation of PM Miro Cerar in mid-March.
Foreign Minister Karl Erjavec, who was at the session but was not given time to present his position, told the press he was appalled by the non-decision. He added that he expected the government to put forward a proposal.
He said that recognition of Palestine as an independent state was not a discussion on whether the conditions had been met.
Erjavec noted that the government had discussed the issue several times. In March, before Cerar's resignation, the minister proposed the recognition but the proposal was removed from the agenda for lack of consensus.
The minister disagrees with the argument that the National Assembly cannot carry out the procedure without the government proposal, and with the opinion of the parliamentary legal service that recognition of states does not fall within the scope of the tasks of the caretaker government.
Erjavec said that the National Assembly should be able to take its position on recognition of Palestine.
The minister criticised a part of the senior coalition Modern Centre Party (SMC) deputy group, which "does not want to carry out this procedure". He also pointed a finger at Cerar for complicating the matter further with his resignation.
It was not fair of Cerar to resign after a government session before acquainting the coalition partners with his decision. If this was known during the session, a discussion on Palestine would have certainly been endorsed, he said.
"I feel betrayed in a way, because the [Foreign] Ministry has prepared a motion," said Erjavec, who is convinced that recognition of Palestine would be a step forward in the Middle East peace process.
Erjavec hopes that the government will hold a session on Thursday. "The government needs to sort out the matter", he said, adding that it would be right if the government proposed to parliament to recognise Palestine and let it decide.
Vatovec too criticised the SMC "for supporting this eminent show of unprincipledness and hypocrisy," given the fact that five SMC deputies endorsed Horvat's proposal, which according to him is "illegal per se".
He said that the Left had insisted that a vote is taken so that it would show who supported recognition of Palestine in principle and who did not, adding that parliament had the power to carry out the recognition.
According to Vatovec, the story does not end today, as he expects that parliament will be deciding on Palestine before the end of the current term. He said that the party needed to examine all possibilities.
Opposition Democrats (SDS) head Janez Janša, who voted for Horvat's proposal, said that "we should stop making a farce of this issue".
The SDS is against recognition of Palestine at the moment in principle, as Palestine does not have all the attributes a state needs, and recognition would bring no benefit for Slovenia, only harm, he added.
