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Slovenia to Prove Its Skills as a Host Again

Ljubljana, 28 May

A meeting of the 16 Central European presidents to be held this Friday and Saturday at Bled and Brdo pri Kranju, is to be not only the largest multi-lateral event held in Slovenia to date, but also one of the most important. As the officials participating in its organisation point out, it might prove to be even more demanding than any of the previous top official meetings held in Slovenia, among them the meeting of U.S. President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin and two visits by the Pope John Paul II. This is the second time Slovenia will host a meeting of the Central European presidents after eight heads of states met on the Slovene coast in 1997.

This year's summit will be hosted by Slovene President Milan Kucan, while presidents from Austria, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Macedonia, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, the Ukraine and Yugoslavia, are to attend. This is the first time that the heads of state from Macedonia and Bosnia are to take part in this traditional meeting. Besides the presidents a further 200 accompanying persons are expected, and more than 1,500 people will be involved in the organisation of the summit, while around 2,000 police officers are to be deployed to provide security. So far some 170 foreign and 80 Slovene journalists have already accredited to cover the event. According to the director of uniformed police Stanislav Veniger, the summit is a challenging project, which will also bear its financial costs, as some 433 million tolars (cca. 2 million euros) will be spent for security during the two-day event.

Approximately 800 police officers took care of security at the fourth meeting of the Central European presidents, which was held at the Slovene coastal cities of Piran and Portoroz in June 1997. The two-day event attracted some 120 foreign and the same number of domestic journalists.

To mark this year's presidential summit, two stamps have been issued, one with the picture of the island on Lake Bled and the other with a silhouette of all 16 participating countries with the Brdo mansion in the background.

STA (Slovene Press Agency)