Fico dreams of Slovakia's "neutrality"

He made this statement during a visit to the Ministry of Economy, where the reporting day was held.

Fico said he has a feeling that "the world is changing."

Speaking for myself, I will tell you that in these absurd times of armaments, when arms companies are rubbing their hands together just as pharmaceutical companies did during Covid, neutrality would suit Slovakia very well.

Robert Fico

Prime Minister of Slovakia

According to him, he had already raised the issue of neutrality "very officially and very clearly," but admitted that the decision on this did not depend solely on him.

The prime minister's statement came on the eve of a roundtable with President Peter Pellegrini, where representatives of parliamentary parties were to discuss the issue of increasing the defense budget.

The opposition's reaction was immediate. The leader of the most powerful opposition force, Progressive Slovakia, Michal Šimečka, called Fico's words scandalous and accused him of seeking to withdraw the country from the North Atlantic Alliance.

Robert Fico dreams of neutrality. He is actually questioning our NATO membership, which is the basis of our security. This is destroying Slovakia's foreign policy and playing into Putin's hands.

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said he would not support the 18th package of EU sanctions against Russia "unless the European Commission proposes a real solution to the crisis situation in which Slovakia will find itself after the complete cessation of gas, oil and nuclear fuel supplies from Russia."