MORNING NEWS HIGHLIGHTS - Thursday, February 27, 2020 - 9 a.m.

27. februára 2020 9:00
TASR brings a quick morning overview of the most important events seen in Slovakia on the previous day (Wednesday, February 26): BRATISLAVA - The final special parliamentary session before the general election has ended, with Parliamentary Chair Andrej Danko (Slovak National Party/SNS) announcing its conclusion after the House failed to achieve a quorum to vote on the Government's proposal to deal with a bill increasing child benefit via fast-track proceedings for the second time on Wednesday. The vote on increasing child benefit was the final point on the agenda of the special parliamentary session, as the Government withdrew its proposal to scrap highway stickers from Parliament earlier in the day. MOSCOW - Supplying and transporting natural gas as well as the issue of nuclear waste disposal were high on the agenda of a meeting between Slovak Prime Minister Peter Pellegrini (Smer-SD) and his Russian counterpart Mikhail Mishustin in Moscow on Wednesday. Pellegrini pointed out that he was the first foreign official to be received by the new Russian prime minister since the latter took up office in mid-January. The visit took place at the invitation of the Russian premier. MOSCOW - Slovak Prime Minister Peter Pellegrini's (Smer-SD) delegation at its meeting with Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin on Wednesday proposed Russia to use Slovak pipelines to interconnect Austria and Hungary following last week's signature of a memorandum between Slovakia and Hungary on the use of excess gas capacities from the Turkish Stream pipeline, Economy Minister Peter Ziga (Smer-SD) told journalists in Moscow. "We asked the Russian side to use this route to avoid the need to build other parallel connections, for example between Hungary and Austria," said Ziga, adding that the Slovak delegation also informed the Russians about building additional transportation capacities between Slovakia and the Czech Republic. "So we asked the Russian side to, also based on the new contract with Ukraine, use the existing gas interconnection between Ukraine and Slovakia as much as possible," said Ziga. BRATISLAVA - An investigator has terminated the criminal investigation in the case of the potential plagiarism of the rigorous thesis submitted by Andrej Danko (SNS) at Matej Bel University in Banska Bystrica, Banska Bystrica regional police spokesperson Maria Faltaniova confirmed for TASR on Wednesday. According to the spokesperson, the police saw no reason to advance the case to a prosecutor. The investigator's decision isn't yet valid. "An investigator of the Banska Bystrica Regional Police Corps Directorate ... terminated the criminal investigation because the deed wasn't a crime and there was no reason to advance the case [to trial]," said Faltaniova. BRATISLAVA - Slovakia currently has stable but slower economic growth, low unemployment and stable inflation, but 18 other EU countries had a better budgetary performance in 2019, wrote the European Commission (EC) in its regular evaluation report on Slovakia 2020, which was published along with versions for all other EU countries on Wednesday. Slovakia hasn't fully exploited good times of economic growth for structural reforms and deficit and debt reduction, and is lagging behind in key areas for future growth. With its economic performance, Slovakia is gradually ceasing to approach the European average and remains at around 75 percent of the EU's average gross national income (GNI). "We had the fastest pace of catching up in 2003-2008, but we've been practically stagnating since 2012," said Livia Vasakova, head of the economic analysis team of the EC representation in Slovakia. BRATISLAVA - Greenpeace Slovakia placed on Wednesday a burning model of the Earth in front of Bratislava Castle in order to draw attention to the importance of the upcoming general election in connection to the battle against climate change. According to the organisation, climate change is among the greatest threats Slovakia faces. "The longer we keep postponing necessary measures for battling climate change, the more expensive and difficult they"ll become. What"s worse is that its consequences will be even more irreversible," stated Greenpeace Slovakia programme head Katarina Jurikova. ko
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