ZAGREB, December 29, 2018 - Slovenian Prime Minister Marjan Šarec told the Dnevnik daily of Saturday that his government's position on the border arbitration with Croatia could not be different from the position of the previous government led by Miro Cerar, who is now Foreign Minister.

"The arbitration ruling has been made public, Slovenia has its position on it and cannot change it," Šarec said in a pre-New Year interview with the Ljubljana-based newspaper.

Recalling that Slovenia had sued Croatia with the Luxembourg-based Court of Justice of the EU over its noncompliance with the arbitration ruling, alleging that Croatia was thus violating EU law, Šarec said that Ljubljana was waiting for the court to make a ruling and for Croatia to respond to Slovenia's proposal for the establishment of a joint border demarcation commission to implement the arbitration ruling. "We are still waiting for a response to our proposal," he said.

In 2015 Croatia decided, following a unanimous decision of its parliament to that effect, to walk out of border arbitration proceedings, after secret communication between former Slovene arbiter Jernej Sekolec and Slovenian Foreign Ministry official Simona Drenik was leaked, showing that they had worked on a strategy to exert influence on the arbiters and their decision, thus contaminating and compromising the arbitration process.

Croatia therefore does not consider the subsequent arbitration ruling as binding, and has notified Slovenia of its position, offering bilateral talks on the border dispute, which Ljubljana does not accept.

Asked about his communication with Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković, Šarec said that he respected him and that their discussions at sessions of the European Council were normal but that due to the principled position on the arbitration issue, he had not invited Plenković to visit Slovenia because he was waiting for Croatia to change its position on the arbitration issue, whereas Slovenia could not change its position about the implementation of the arbitration ruling being binding.

Commenting on Cerar's recent visit to Washington, seen as an attempt by Slovenia to establish balance in its relationship with great powers, Šarec described it as good.

"We are being criticised for being pro-Russian but I don't think that's the case. Our relations with the Russian Federation are just as they should be. There was a certain deficit in relations with the United States, but it is also true that those relations are now more problematic also at EU level, due to the new leadership in the White House," he said in the interview, among other things.

More news on the border dispute between Croatia and Slovenia can be found in our Politics section.

ZAGREB, December 18, 2018 - Slovenian Prime Minister Marjan Šarec said on Monday that the question if and when Croatia would enter the Schengen area should be directed at the European evaluation commission for meeting the Schengen criteria and not at Slovenia, adding that with regards to the border dispute with Croatia, his government maintained the same position of the previous Slovenian government led by Miro Cerar, who is also the foreign ministry in the incumbent cabinet, and that the border dispute was preventing an improvement in Croatia-Slovenia relations.

Šarec said the Slovenian police were doing a good job of monitoring the external Schengen border towards Croatia, but that his government advocated a stronger Frontex role at the EU external border, namely Croatia's border towards Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia, where there is a large number of potential illegal migrants who want to enter the Schengen area through Slovenia.

According to him, the number of illegal migrants caught in Slovenia this year had quadrupled.

Asked to comment on bilateral relations with Croatia, Šarec said that the problem regarding the implementation of the arbitration decision, according to which Slovenia would gain most of Savudrija Bay and a corridor to open seas, obstructed the improvement of relations with Croatia.

Slovenia sent a proposal to Croatia to set up a demarcation commission which would implement the arbitration decision, but Croatia has not responded, Šarec said.

More news on the Croatia-Slovenia border dispute can be found in our Politics section.

ZAGREB, December 15, 2018 - New negotiations on the border dispute with Croatia would not be productive, so Slovenia insists on the implementation of the arbitration ruling, Slovenian Foreign Minister Miro Cerar told reporters during a visit to Washington on Friday.

"Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was grateful that I clearly explained our position. A return to negotiations with Croatia would not be productive," Cerar said after meeting with Pompeo and National Security Advisor John Bolton at the State Department.

Refusal to implement the arbitration ruling means "ignoring international law", which is bad for the whole Western Balkans region, Cerar said.

His former government had sued Croatia to the Court of Justice of the European Union in Luxembourg, arguing that Croatia's refusal to implement the arbitration ruling was in violation of EU law.

"We hear ministers and prime ministers in the region say they are surprised that they are required to honour the rule of law while Croatia doesn't do that in the case of the arbitration ruling," Cerar said, adding that Pompeo had promised to consider the matter thoroughly.

More news on the border dispute between Croatia and Slovenia and the relations between the two countries in general can be found in our Politics section.

ZAGREB, October 12, 2018 - After talks with Slovenian Prime Minister Marjan Šarec in Berlin on Friday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany was willing to contribute to the resolution of the Slovenian-Croatian dispute over the border and the border arbitration decision.

ZAGREB, October 2, 2018 - Slovenian President Borut Pahor said in Geneva on Tuesday that he was confident that the border between Croatia and Slovenia would "sooner or later" be as determined by the international arbitral tribunal, while Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said the arbitration process had been compromised and the two countries should seek a mutually acceptable solution.

ZAGREB, September 21, 2018 - Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said in Salzburg on Thursday that it was essential that Croatia continued building good relations with Slovenia, adding that he considered a success the fact that relations remained good despite an arbitration ruling on their border dispute which Zagreb does not recognise.

ZAGREB, September 20, 2018 - Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said on Thursday that he had met and briefly spoken to Slovenian Prime Minister Marjan Šarec during a working dinner for EU leaders held in Salzburg on Wednesday.

ZAGREB, September 18, 2018 - Spokesman for the European Commission Margaritis Schinas has said that there is no legal obligation for the European Commission to take a stand on Slovenia's lawsuit against Croatia over their border arbitration dispute, and underscored that the Commission does not comment on its internal documents, including a document with an opinion of the Commission's legal experts who reportedly established that Croatia violated EU laws by refusing to accept the 2017 border arbitration award.

ZAGREB, September 16, 2018 - The European Commission was right not to interfere in the Croatia-Slovenia border dispute, the Croatian government said on Saturday in a comment on an article in the German Der Spiegel weekly which says that EC President Jean-Claude Juncker did not want to become involved in the sea border dispute between the two countries even though the EC's legal experts believe that Slovenia is right.

ZAGREB, September 15, 2018 - Croatia and Slovenia should continue dialogue on all outstanding issues, especially the border dispute, Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said in a message to Marjan Šarec congratulating him on becoming the Prime Minister of Slovenia.