House: SNS Withdraws Draft Amendment to Penal Code from Session Agenda

Bratislava, 27 January (TASR) - The junior coalition Slovak National Party (SNS) has withdrawn several of its bills from Parliament, including a draft amendment to the Penal Code that sought to reduce penalties for extremism-related crimes. MPs approved SNS's proposal to withdraw these points from the agenda of the ongoing House session on Tuesday. In addition to the amendment to the Penal Code, SNS has also withdrawn the following amendments from the session's agenda: to the law on state symbols of the Slovak Republic, to the Labour Code, to the law on municipal police, to the social insurance law, and to the income tax law. The withdrawal of the amendment to the Penal Code was previously indicated by Voice-SD caucus head Robert Puci. He said that a joint coalition proposal for changes to the Penal Code would subsequently be submitted to Parliament, but only after agreement with the Justice Ministry. A group of SNS MPs submitted the amendment to Parliament earlier in January. Among other things, it proposed adjustments to penalty ranges for extremism-related crimes, seeking to reduce the upper limits for several of them. SNS defended the proposal by pointing to the need to set penalties in more rational and differentiated manner. ko/df