STA, 5 July 2019 - The police continues to detect a rising trend in the number of illegal crossings of the Slovenian border, with the number standing at 5,345 in the first half of the year or 47.1% more than in the same period in 2018. There is an increasing number of illegal migrants from Pakistan, Algeria and Morocco.

The biggest number of illegal crossings of the borders in the first half of the year was processed by police officers from the Koper, Novo Mesto and Ljubljana police departments.

By the end of June, 2,718 of illegal migrants expressed the intention to ask for international protection, which is 7.5% less than in the first half of 2018 (2,355).

According to the latest report, migrants who express the intention to ask for international protection frequently continue on their way to their actual target countries after being accommodated in asylum centres.

In the first half of the year, police officers recorded 355 cases in which foreigners crossed an internal Schengen border to Slovenia without valid documents or permits, which is 13.2% less than in the same period in 2018.

Pakistanis accounted for the most of such illegal entries, while they also dominate the statistics of illegal crossings of the external Schengen border.

A majority of such cases were recorded on the Slovenian border with Italy (226). The police notes that this is a relatively small number of cases, with the number of illegal entries on the border with Italy having dropped.

A total of 2,178 third country nationals were denied entry at border crossings for failing to meet the conditions to enter Slovenia or other EU countries, which is 10.8% more than in the first half of 2018.

Most of them were rejected on the border crossings with Croatia, and the biggest number of them were citizens of Afghanistan, followed by citizens of the Balkan countries.

The number of foreigners who were processed because they were not permitted to reside in Slovenia or other EU countries increased by almost a third to 2,728.

A majority of the cases related to expired residency permits, mostly involving citizens of the Western Balkan countries. An increasing number of Moldovan citizens are also being processed for this reason, as a consequence of visa liberalisation.

Slovenian police officers returned a total of 3,534 foreigners to the authorities of neighbouring countries in the first half of the year (up from 1,174), most of them to the Croatian authorities.

Foreign authorities meanwhile returned 333 persons to Slovenia in this period, including 23 Slovenian citizens, the report says.

STA, 4 July 2019 - Police have apprehended 97 illegal migrants trying to cross the state border in different parts of the country in the past couple of days. The Koper police department have dealt with most of them. The majority were Pakistani citizens.

The Koper police department apprehended 73 between Wednesday and Thursday morning - 62 of them were Pakistani citizens, with the rest coming from Bangladesh, Iran, India, Morocco, Syria and Tunisia.

Two of them have asked for international protection, while the rest are expected to be handed over to the Croatian authorities.

Tuesday was particularly busy for the coastal region. According to the newspaper Primorske Novice, locals in the south-western village Hrušica spotted a large group of illegal migrants, at least 100, late in the afternoon.

Furthermore, a police car involved in the pursuit that followed crashed into a tree and flipped onto its side. Four police officers suffered minor injuries in the collision.

The Novo Mesto police department apprehended on Wednesday 14 illegal migrants from Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan. The processing has not yet been completed.

Meanwhile, the Maribor police department processed 7 foreigners in the past 24 hours, including citizens from Algeria, Iraq and Iran. All of them will be handed over to the Croatian authorities. Some of them have already been apprehended in April this year or September last year.

The Ljubljana police department apprehended three illegal migrants in the south-eastern Kočevje and central Grosuplje area in the past 24 hours, with the processing still ongoing.

STA, 1 July 2019 - The Slovenian and Italian police forces will be jointly patrolling the countries' border as of Monday in a bid to control illegal migration. The measure taken under an agreement signed by Slovenia and Italy is expected to be implemented until 30 September.

According to the Slovenian General Police Administration, four joint patrols a week are planned, three on the Slovenian side of the border and one on the Italian side.

The patrols will be carried out in sections where frequent illegal crossings of the border are detected, and will feature officers from the Koper and Nova Gorica police departments.

Police will be active along the green border and on former border crossings but Marjan Štubljar of the General Police Administration told the press today that "this is definitely not a restoration of border checks" and will not effect passengers.

The police said that in addition to the operational value, the mixed patrols are expected to produce indirect results, such as faster exchange of information and learning the terrain in the neighbouring country for cases of cross-border pursuit.

The measure is also a clear signal to traffickers of illegal migrants that entry to another country does not mean that procedures would not be launched against them in the country which they fled.

The patrols will be led by the home officers and the visiting police officers will only be able to use firearms for the purpose of self-defence.

The Slovenian police have already participated in this way with Austria and Hungary, while Italy already has mixed patrols with Austria, Switzerland and France.

Slovenian police handled 5,306 crossings of the border by 29 June this year after the figure reached 3,612 in the same period in 2018. Italian authorities returned 146 foreigners to Slovenia by 29 June this year (158 in same period in 2018), mostly citizens of Afghanistan, Algeria and Pakistan.

Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini said on Thursday that, if the mixed patrols failed to prevent illegal migration, Italy would erect physical obstacles on the border with Slovenia.

The measure was first proposed by Slovenian Foreign Minister Miro Cerar to Italian counterpart Enzo Moavero Milanesi in mid-May as the number of migrants coming from the Balkans to Italy through Slovenia has been increasing.

Cerar said he thus wanted to show to Italy that Slovenia wanted to strengthen mutual trust, and the idea was also discussed and agreed on shortly after that by the countries' police commissioners.

STA, 23 June 2019 - Slovenia and Italy will launch joint mixed border patrols on 1 July, Italy's Interior Minister Matteo Salvini said on Saturday, according to news reports. Slovenia's Foreign Ministry told Radio Slovenia on Sunday that an implementation agreement would be signed in the coming week and confirmed the date of the launch.

After the Slovenian police told the STA that the countries are yet to sign the implementation agreement, the Foreign Ministry said that the document would be signed in the coming week. It did not say who would sign it, however, Prime Minister Marjan Šarec is due in the Vatican on Thursday.

The patrols are to be the same as those patrolling the border between Italy and France, according to a report by the Austrian press agency APA. It adds that so far nearly 800 illegal migrants have been detected entering Italy from Slovenia this year.

The joint patrols were proposed by Slovenia's Foreign Minister Miro Cerar. At the same time, he underlined that internal border controls in the Schengen zone were unacceptable to Slovenia. The issues of security and migrations must be addressed together so as to avoid border controls, he said.

STA, 17 June 2019 - The aid provided to migrants by the Legal and Information Centre (PIC), a group of NGOs, does not constitute a crime, Interior Minister Boštjan Poklukar told the National Assembly during questions time on Monday. He was answering a question from the opposition Democrats (SDS), who are appalled that these NGOs get state funding.

This comes less than a month after PIC president Katarina Bervar Sternad was reported to the police by Zmago Jelinčič, the president of the opposition National Party (SNS).

Poklukar confirmed today that the police saw an increase in the number of times PIC informed the police of illegal migrants entering the country.

Apart from informing the police of the migrants' location, PIC also sent to the police their names and informed them of the migrants' medical state, Poklukar said.

The minister said that migrants had told the police a PIC representative had given them directions, handed out leaflets with directions and advised them on how to conduct themselves in police proceedings and other procedures.

Both the relevant District Prosecution and the Supreme State Prosecution shared the view that PIC's actions did not amount to a crime, according to Poklukar.

The Supreme Prosecution also said that PIC's activities would have been criminal if they were done for financial gain, the minister added.

The answer was provided to SDS deputy Branko Grims, who said in his question that PIC was actively helping migrants in abusing the asylum procedure.

The covers and editorials from leading weeklies of the Left and Right for the work-week ending Friday, 14 June 2019

Mladina: New EU Core Emerging Post-Brexit, Slovenia Should Optimise Its Position

STA, 14 June 2019 - The left-leaning weekly paper Mladina argues on Friday that the EU will in fact breathe much more easily without Great Britain. New constellations are likely to emerge in the wake of its departure and Slovenia should make sure to be among the core EU countries that take a step forward integration and policy-wise, editor-in-chief Grega Repovž says.

It actually looks like optimism is making a comeback in political analytical centres in the EU's capitals after a long time, Repovž says, arguing Europe will simply become a much more flexible alliance without Great Britain.

He speaks of signs that a two-tier EU is emerging, with the second tier involving Eastern European countries - an exception being Slovenia as a member of the eurozone.

The eurozone is looking like a bypass that can "enable most normal European countries to start pursuing more serious policies which are blocked today in particular by Eastern European nationalist and backward populists".

Slovenia is being referred to as a part of this emerging coalition, as part of what is being called the EU's core, "but the question is whether our government is aware of this", Repovž says in Core of Europe In the Making.

Slovenia should optimise its position and have an influence on the agenda of this coalition, which is why Prime Minister Marjan Šarec, who has no serious diplomats or experienced international analysts among his ranks, needs to move fast and form a strong team around him.

"Why are we warning about this? In order to avoid hearing excuses again in a few years about how it was only possible to implement what was received in e-mails from Brussels and Berlin and to not feel embarrassed about the amateurs we had in power when the future was being designed," Repovž says, invoking the example of the 2013 bank bailout.

Demokracija: Interior Minister Should Resign Over Illegal Migration

STA, 13 June 2019 - The right-wing weekly Demokracija calls on Interior Minister Boštjan Poklukar to resign for being unable to provide for security of locals in border areas, listing several cases of unpleasant encounters between illegal migrants and locals, including a recent incident involving an 11-year-old girl.

Editor-in-chief Jože Biščak says on Thursday Poklukar bragged about the Slovenian police having successfully provided for security at the recent Three Seas Initiative summit.

"When the high-profile guests were adopting the closing Ljubljana Declaration to set up an investment fund ..., a drama was almost simultaneously unfolding on a bridge over the river Reka."

An 11-year-old was crossing it by bike in the area of Ilirska Bistrica in the south-west when she heard voices under the bridge, and stopped.

A group of men then started yelling and throwing stones at her, with one stone hitting her hand. Her parents reported the incident to the police, Biščak recalls.

The majority of police officers were protecting well-mannered Three Seas Initiative guests, "while the southern border remains full of holes like Swiss cheese".

If border control was stricter and better and if legislation was more in favour of Slovenians than foreigners, the illegal migrants would not have come that far into Slovenian territory, they would have been intercepted on the border and swiftly returned where they came from, to Croatia, Bosnia and further to the Arab world.

Biščak says the girl, a recently abducted pensioner, a wine grower whose van was stolen from his courtyard or any other person whose property has been destroyed by illegals would find it hard to agree with Poklukar that the police is in control of the situation.

What happened in Western Europe, is now starting to happen in Slovenia - while it began with small thefts and fights, today those who came to Europe a few years ago are claiming entire areas where they enforce their religion-based rules and where the police does not dare to go any more.

Biščak says such areas, controlled by Muslims and ruled by Sharia law, could well emerge in Slovenia, adding "Islam is not a religion, it is a spiritual, judicial and political system, and is not compatible with any western democracy".

While some countries such as Italy and Hungary have managed to secure their border against illegals, the Slovenian government has proved completely incapable of taking action.

All our posts in this series can be found here, while you can keep up-to-date on Slovenia politics here, and find the daily headlines here

Mladina: Slovenia has short-sighted migration policy

STA, 17 May 2019 - Commenting on the migration situation, the weekly Mladina says in Friday's editorial that the government of Marjan Šarec is continuing the short-sighted policy of the previous government of Miro Cerar by increasing the number of police officers and soldiers on the border, setting up more fence an preventing asylum requests.

"However, it does not have the courage to set up reception centres and face the migration flow, process these people and determine who meets the conditions [to stay in the country] and who does not, help them integrate or return them to their countries if they are not danger zones - in short, what this country was actually doing before the 2015 refugee wave," says editor-in-chief Grega Repovž.

The number of crossings of the border and asylum requests has not risen so much. "We have seen all this before and dealt with it for decades - but now we have closed the borders and thus turned refugees into illegal migrants and pushed them to city streets, outskirts of villages and forests."

We have no idea how many of them are moving illegally across the country or waiting for transport out of the country in Ljubljana, Repovž says.

We also have no idea how many people are illegally transporting refugees or provide them with shelters in exchange for money, or how many supply them with food. That is the reality, according to Repovž.

As soon as a country starts breaking the law, it has a hard time demanding from others to respect international law.

"And that is what is our biggest mistake. We know that refugees in Croatia have no rights. That they are being illegally transported to Bosnia-Herzegovina. By copying these patterns, we are losing the opportunity to demand the respect of European asylum rules from our neighbour," Repovž says under the headline More Fences, More Soldiers, More Cops.

Demokracija: Critical of govt's inaction after abduction

STA, 16 May 2019 - The right-wing weekly Demokracija is critical of the government after an elderly man was abducted by a group of illegal migrants who stole his car to reach the border with Italy.

"Pro-migrant activists and the agitprop of mainstream media launched a theory that Moravec was not abducted, that the abduction had been staged for the purpose of EU election campaign."

It is horrifying how far some politicians, pro-migrant mouthpieces and agitprop Bolsheviks have gone.

Instead of condemning the abduction and promising to do anything in their power to prevent something like this from happening again, the left has decided to criminalise the victims.

What is more, they labelled the protest in which locals expressed their concern a rally of intolerance and hate speech. It is incomprehensible that people even have to take to the streets for the government to start following the rules.

"We need to make it clear: It's been enough! If the government fails to guarantee security and respect for its own laws, the people have the right to protect their property and lives themselves!" the weekly says under the headline Hostage and Soros's Devil's Advocates.

STA, 17 May 2019 - Slovenian police officers are systemically denying migrants the right to asylum and are illegally returning them to Croatia, according to a report by Info Kolpa, a civil initiative launched about a year ago in response to growing allegations by migrants that Slovenia was denying them the right to asylum. Police deny the accusations.

The initiative wanted to determine whether migrants who requested asylum in Slovenia were refouled to Croatia, where they were subjected to systemic physical and psychological abuse by the police.

To determine what was happening along the Schengen border, the initiative set up an SOS number to which migrants are able to report their names along with their intent to request asylum and their locations upon entering the country. The initiative then forwards the data to the police, the human rights ombudsman and Amnesty International.

The report also notes that there was a rapid drop in the number of asylum seekers in the span of a single month. In May 2018, the Črnomelj police station apprehended 379 migrants of whom 371 (98%) requested asylum. "In June, there was a drastic change in how procedures were conducted at the Črnomelj police station: out of 412 persons processed, only 13 requested asylum."

The report, compiled in cooperation with the Border Violence Monitoring NGO, says that this was proof that the police were covering up what was going on at police stations along the border, and "mass malversation in how asylum procedures are conducted by the Slovenian police".

"This radical change is in correlation with contentious instructions by Police Commissioner Simon Velički about returning migrants to the Croatian police ... dated to 25 May 2018."

The report lists several cases of migrants who sent their names and locations to Kolpa Info. It is not known what happened to many of them after their information was forwarded to the police.

Moreover, in many cases people were refouled back to Croatia and further south to Bosnia-Herzegovina, often being beaten by the Croatian police. Many report of having their money taken by the Croatian police, as well as cellphones and other possessions.

The report includes the story of a man whose shoes were taken away by the Croatian police in February and had to have his toes amputated as a result.

The initiative says that the stories of migrants paint a grave picture about the way Slovenian police operate when it comes to the treatment of migrants.

"The violations are not sporadic and they do not depend on individual police officers, they amount to systemic denial of the right to international protection, an order coming from the top of the police force, and with the knowledge of the top officials of the Interior Ministry."

The head of the border police, Peter Skerbiš, rejected the accusations saying the actions of the Slovenian police were professional and in line with the law. He said police did not deny anyone the right to international protection.

Skerbiš told the press today that these claims had been checked several times in the past by NGOs, the Human Rights Ombudsman and the UNHCR. No irregularities had been found, he said.

Police officers have received no instruction to push people back and the foreigners who express the intention to request asylum are transported to the asylum centre.

Only those who do not want to request for asylum are returned to Croatia after evidence is gathered that they entered Slovenia from there.

Regarding claims about Croatian police violence, Skerbiš said that Croatia is an EU member state and considered a safe country. "We have so far received no information or instruction from EU institutions that foreigners must not be sent to Croatia."

The initiative demands an immediate stop of what they say is collective refoulement of migrants on the basis of a bilateral border control agreement, immediate annulment of this agreement and the upholding of the right of international protection.

The initiative also demands civil oversight over police work when it comes to migrants. Moreover, it says the police must disclose contentious internal communication, while investigations must be launched against former commissioner Simon Velički, his successor Tatjana Bobnar, as well as former interior minister Vesna Györkös Žnidar and former state secretary Boštjan Šefic.

STA, 12 May 2019 - Defence Minister Karl Erjavec has announced that the Slovenian Armed Forces (SAF) have deployed additional soldiers to the border with Croatia to help the police manage the increasing number of illegal crossings of the border.

Speaking to the press on the sidelines of a Victory Day ceremony in Topolšica on Saturday, Erjavec said that the help had been requested by the police, adding that the SAF had more units ready to be deployed at any moment.

According to the SAF, an additional 35 soldiers were deployed on Saturday to the southern border, and the current number of soldiers in the daily shift is 66.

The additional 35 soldiers have been deployed to the area covered by the Ilirska Bistrica police station (SW), while the remaining 31 serve in various locations, the army told the STA.

The police and armed forces have thus responded to the increasing number of illegal crossings of the border, as detected also by the locals living along the border.

The calls for better border control culminated after a 79-year-old local was abducted in his car on Wednesday by four illegal migrants.

Erjavec said on Saturday that he was in constant touch with Interior Minister Boštjan Poklukar regarding the issue, while Police Commissioner Tatjana Bobnar and the army chief-of-staff, Maj-Gen Alenka Ermenc were coordinating the operative measures.

"I can say that we have units ready to boost the presence of the Slovenian army on the southern border at any moment, of course in mixed units with the police," the minister added.

Črnomelj protesters demand better control of border

STASTA, 11 May 2019 - Several hundred people gathered in the town of Črnomelj (SE) Saturday afternoon demanding better control of Slovenia's southern border. The rally was called after four illegal migrants abducted an elderly man earlier this week and used his car to drive to the border with Italy [more on that story here].

"Instead of ensuring our safety, those in charge have been telling us that Slovenia is safe and that there is no reason for fear," said Maja Kocjan, the president of the local civil initiative.

The protesters believe that the government and the police are not doing enough to protect the locals living along the border, with many signing a petition with five key demands. Unless they are taken seriously, another rally is to be organised in Ljubljana.

The petitioners demand that the government prevent illegal migrants from crossing the border, provide protection to people and property, and deploy additional police and military officers, if necessary. Calls like "Military to the border!" were heard a number of times during the protest.

The petition also demands changes to the asylum legislation so that people coming from safe countries could not request asylum in the country.

Moreover, the government must also stop procedures for the establishment of migrant registration centres, as protesters fear that these would become permanent migrant centres.

One such centre has been planned for the area of Ilirska Bistrica, a town further west along the southern border, where a civil initiative has been fighting against the centre for months.

Ilirska Bistrica Mayor Emil Rojc, a member of the centre-left Social Democrats (SD), also addressed the rally. Meanwhile, the Črnomelj Mayor Andrej Kavšek was not at the rally.

People have come to Črnomelj from all across the country and it was hard to tell how many of them were locals, according a report by to TV Slovenija.

A number of politicians also joined the protest, among them right-leaning candidates vying in the European Parliament election.

Also there was Janez Janša, the head of the opposition Democrats (SDS), accompanied by several senior members of the party, including MEP Milan Zver. Local initiative head Kocjan is also a member.

Janša told the press that the SDS had been trying to get the demands in the petition enacted for years. He said that they would "continue to pressure those in charge to start listening to the people".

He was critical that Prime Minister Marjan Šarec has not called a meeting of the National Security Council to improve border security, not even after the abduction.

Also at the rally was Marjan Podobnik, the president of the non-parliamentary People's Party (SLS), which had joined forces with the SDS for the 26 May election.

Senior members of the non-parliamentary right-wing Homeland League (DOM) and United Slovenia were also in the crowd.

STA, 9 May 2019 - With a number of countries within the Schengen zone continuing to carry out internal border checks, including neighbouring Austria, a majority of the parties standing in the 26 May European election claim such checks are unwarranted. Some perceive them as an expression of a lack of trust in Slovenian politics.

The coalition parties generally share the opinion that internal border checks are not warranted, as passing borders without checks is one of the most tangible advantages of EU membership.

The ruling Marjan Šarec List (LMŠ) believes that the rules on temporary border checks within the Schengen zone should be redefined to prevent abuse of the system.

The Social Democrats (SD) think that checks on internal borders are unwarranted, except in extraordinary situations. Any obstacles to the free flow of people, services, goods and capital are unacceptable, the party says.

The Pensioners' Party (DeSUS) finds Austria's border checks unacceptable. "We don't want a future in which counties make unilateral decisions about such fundamental values and treaties, such as the Schengen Agreement."

The Modern Centre Party (SMC) sees Austria's decision as a violation of the fundamental principles of the EU, arguing that Slovenia is protecting the Schengen border responsibly. It sees the political situation in Austria as the main reason for border checks.

Also stressing that the checks on the Slovenian-Austrian border are unwarranted is the Alenka Bratušek Party (SAB), which says it is a mere "implementation of cheap nationalist politics".

The opposition Democrats (SDS) and the non-parliamentary People's Party (SLS), who are running on a joint ticket, believe that internal border checks are a result of the increasing threat of terrorism and illegal mass migrations.

Internal border checks run counter to the idea of free movement of people, but only effective protection of the external border would make internal checks unnecessary, the parties says.

While noting that internal border checks undermine one of the fundamental freedoms in the EU, the opposition New Slovenia (NSi) believes that these are an obvious sign of distrust among EU member states, a problem that needs to be addressed as soon as possible.

The Left, an opposition partner to the minority ruling coalition, warns that checks on internal borders run against the concept of open borders as one of the fundamental EU values. The measure is unlawful and undermines the principles on which the EU is based.

The opposition National Party (SNS), meanwhile, believes that Slovenia should seal its Schengen border with Croatia and let only people with valid documents in the country. Controls on the border should be constant and strict.

Similarly, the Homeland League (DOM) thinks that Austria's measure is self-explanatory, as Slovenia has failed to protect its border since 2015. "If border protection is not effective, the Schengen border will be moved from the river Kolpa to the Karavanke mountain range."

On the other hand, the Let's Connect list believes that such checks are no longer warranted from either the security or customs aspects. It is propaganda aimed at creating the false feeling of an outside threat, it says.

Good State believes that Austria is using the situation for political purposes. Internal checks are unwarranted and the Slovenian government should take counter-measures and check people coming to Slovenia from Austria.