Brian McDonald
Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico made his first public comments since an assassination attempt last month left him in a life-threatening situation.
On a 14-minute speech posted to his Facebook page on Wednesday, Fico, 59, said he feels “no hatred” for his alleged killer, who he said was neither “a crazy person” nor acting alone. “I forgive him,” said Fico, adding that “he was just a messenger of evil and political hatred, which the politically unsuccessful and frustrated opposition developed in Slovakia to uncontrollable proportions.”
The prime minister suggested that his pro-Russian, anti-NATO and anti-US stances made him a target. Fico ended his country’s military aid to Ukraine after his coalition government took office on October 25. He also opposes EU sanctions on Russia and wants to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO.
SMER/Robert Fico via Facebook
“The opposition abuses the way large democracies impose a single binding opinion on major foreign policy issues and rejects the sovereign positions of small countries,” said Fico, referring to the opposition Progressive Slovakia party, a pro-liberal party. Western side with which Fico’s own left-wing Smer party (Direction) is in a tight race to win the European Parliament elections.
Fico said that although his party won the country’s parliamentary elections on September 30, there had been, since his assassination attempt, “no one who held up a mirror to the growing and well-fed aggression of the opposition, not even the media , nor non-governmental organizations”. , not the head of state, not Brussels, not NATO.”
Fico was shot several times on May 15, as he left a government meeting in the city of Handlova, about 145 kilometers northeast of the capital Bratislava, shocking the small country and reverberating throughout Europe. The 71-year-old suspect He was knocked to the ground and arrested.
Radovan Stoklasa/REUTERS
Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok said in May that an initial investigation found “a clear political motivation” behind the attack, although it appeared the accused suspect was a lone wolf who “did not belong to any political group.”
Two days after the shooting, Health Minister Zuzana Dolinkova said Fico underwent a two-hour surgery to remove dead tissue from multiple gunshot wounds. Defense Minister Robert Kalinak said at the time that “several miracles” occurred at the hands of Fico’s medical team.
In Wednesday’s speech, Fico, speaking firmly, said he could gradually return to work in June or July.
“I would like to express my conviction that all the pain I have gone through and am still going through will serve some good,” he said near the end of his speech. “People could see for themselves the horror that can happen if someone is not able to compete democratically and respect other opinions.”
—The Associated Press contributed reporting.
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