AT THE RECEPTION FOR THE DIPLOMATIC CORPS
President Milan Kucan at the traditional reception for Diplomatic corps

Brdo by Kranj, 17 January 2001























May I once again offer you a very warm greeting at this now traditional post-New Year gathering, and begin by wishing you and your families much personal happiness and success in this New Year. My wish is that this year our meeting will again be an opportunity to converse on current international events and on the place and role of Slovenia in international life. I am pleased to be hosting this year's occasion together with the Prime Minister, Dr Janez Drnov¹ek.

The world is changing very rapidly. Globalisation and the rapid dynamic of events and changes are toppling traditional constants, and are presenting us with new challenges and questions. Yet despite what we have achieved, we are still far removed from the desired global security and peace, the elimination of poverty, far from a reduction in the enormous differences in prosperity, development and ensuring of people's social and legal safety, far from fruitful competition and cooperation between the different civilisations to which we belong and which enrich the creative and spiritual life of humankind.

We are still witness to tensions and to the violent resolving of open issues. Armed conflicts are now taking place more within the borders of individual sovereign states and no longer so frequently in relations between them. Within individual countries there are mass and systematic violations of human rights, military aggression, genocide and ethnic cleansing. The fate of people thus still depends on racial, national or religious affiliation. And for this reason respect of human dignity and individual and collective human rights is becoming an increasingly important universal principle of today’s world order.

This was the fundamental finding from the jubilee session of the UN General Assembly in September 2000. It was followed by the resolution that the UN would be able to wield the necessary political will and demonstrate that it is capable in the name of the international community of protecting the civilian population from genocide, ethnic cleansing and mass, systematic aggression from the authorities and from people’s fellow citizens in their own country. Hence the need to establish humanitarian intervention in the functioning of the UN as a means for such protection, and this opens an important new chapter in international relations and international law.

This year Slovenia will celebrate the tenth anniversary of its statehood. When we look back, we see that there was no other good option. Every nation, including the Slovenes, has the right to freedom and a future. The Yugoslavia of that time had closed the path towards a creative future for people and nations. And for that reason it fell apart. As a member of the world family of countries, Slovenia today shares the fate of the world in its everyday trials and challenges for a better tomorrow. It is aware of its responsibility in the world, and we wish to contribute our share towards its safe and peaceful future. Especially on the continent where we live. Hence our efforts towards membership in the EU and the Euro-Atlantic alliance. Over this past decade Slovenia has become a democratic and stable country with commendable economic development and social cohesion. It is finalising its internal renewal and consolidating its place and identity in the international environment, a process to which you yourselves have contributed significantly.

Last year, owing to a complicated internal political situation, Slovenia lost a great deal of time and strength. Yet it is important that through democratic procedures and mechanisms we were able to prevent the government crisis from growing into a political or constitutional crisis. I believe that this year, through the work of the large government coalition and with a consensus among political parties we will be able to make up for the lost time in structural reforms and establishing European standards. The cornerstone of all actions remains the equality of people in all their diversity, their equality in individual and collective rights, their security and respect for their dignity. It is time for the burdens of the inclement past to remain behind us, and to face the challenges of our time and the future.

We regard the Nice summit as an important achievement by the EU members, who succeeded despite numerous unresolved issues and questions over the future enlarged community in clearly expressing the political will and determination to continue with the process of enlargement. We assume that this has finally opened the path to the candidate countries, including Slovenia. We have never seen our accession to the EU as a competition with other countries on the same path, but rather as our internal need and a competition with our own abilities. In this endeavour, we will welcome any support, especially from the leading EU member countries. During my meeting on Friday with the President of the Federal Republic of Germany, Mr. Johannes Rau, I shall therefore try to enlist the same kind of support as it was given to us by the Federal Republic of Germany at the time of our gaining independence and international recognition.

The national interests of individual European countries are by the very nature of things different. For this reason it is understandable that even after Nice, numerous issues related to European association remain open. It seems that at the latest European summit, national egoism has been on trial. And this, too, is our reality. But in Nice it was also shown that the United Europe will be a successful community if it is based on all European diversity and at the same time on a common system of values that make up its spiritual cohesive ties. Yet such a community can only be created by states of citizens, which will be governed by individual and collective human rights and in which people will be equal irrespective of national, religious, racial or any other affiliation. I see European association as a long-term historical process, including its ups and downs, in which various forms of enhanced cooperation have both good and bad sides. It is possible that alongside this, the viability and strength of the community will depend on power ratios, or on how far the most advanced countries will identify themselves with the interests of the whole. From this aspect the formula of enhanced cooperation could be a mechanism which actually tend towards strengthening the cooperation between select groups of countries rather than the cooperation of all members in decision-making and in securing the benefit of the whole. Will there be sufficient guarantees that this will not lead to renewed divisions in Europe, and to a repetition of history? It is important to maintain a clear vision as a criterion in all major decisions, including those concerning common institutions and enlargement. The fact is that as a living organism the EU cannot have a final form and final borders. The time has come to finally go beyond the divisions of Europe into the political West and East, and together focus on the future.

Excellencies, last year Slovenia continued to develop good relations with the majority of countries in this world, particularly in Europe. We are fully determined to continue building our relations with the USA, and we also desire more far-reaching and intensive cooperation with the Russian Federation. Yet carefully considered international activity begins at symbolic or actual borders. Relations with neighbours are therefore a constant among the priority tasks of the foreign policy of every country. Slovenia desires good, fruitful and settled relations with all its neighbours. The right path is a patient and ongoing dialogue and a partner in dialogue who desires the same thing, and who as a measure of the future does not use the burdens of the past.

Now is the time and opportunity, in a positive atmosphere, with mutual respect and recognition of the legitimacy of interests and with a commitment to the same values, for us to resolve the open questions between Slovenia and Croatia. It makes no sense in good relations for impasses to arise purely as a consequence of the disintegration of Yugoslavia. Yet for this reason it is necessary to secure the conviction of both countries that settled relations with one’s neighbour are a priority task for the foreign policy strategies of both parties.

We have traditionally well-developed and friendly relations with Austria, going back to the time of Slovenia’s emergence as an independent state. Relations are burdened by history, however, in which we played different parts. For this reason both countries need a common answer as to how to go forward. If there is no such answer, Slovenia might suddenly find itself facing new conditions for accession to the EU, including those that would encroach on the very foundations of its statehood. This might lead to a tense and therefore increasingly less productive atmosphere. I am convinced that neither Slovenia nor Austria could justify such a situation, to their own people, to the EU or to the people of Europe. Hence this situation requires a sober dialogue that will be founded on mutual respect, on equality and on mutuality of interests.

We enjoy good and productive relations with Hungary and Italy, and we have been successful in resolving open questions. In our efforts to gain membership of the EU we enjoy Italian support, and in those to become a member of NATO we have the support of both neighbours. We are convinced moreover, that democratic forces in Italy will possess sufficient power and the Senate will adopt a general protective law for the Slovene minority in what will still be the current legislative term. This would ensure for the Slovene minority in Italy the enjoyment of European standards for minority protection.

Last year’s events in South Eastern Europe, particularly in Serbia and earlier in Croatia, have given us cause for optimism. The region is on course towards stabilisation, peaceful coexistence, at the beginning of new development and opening towards Europe. It has every possibility to become a part of a stable continent. Here a democratic Serbia has a pivotal role and responsibility. Slovenia is setting out as one of its foreign policy priorities the normalisation of relations with the FRY, and with Serbia, as was done earlier with Montenegro, particularly regarding the development of political, economic and cultural relations. This would also ease the lives of people who have been adversely affected by the break-up of the former common state, and hasten the resolving of the difficult issue of succession after the former common state, which is a conditio sine qua non for good relations between the states that have emerged following the collapse of the former Yugoslavia.

Excellencies, friends, allow me on this occasion to thank you most sincerely for everything you have done for good relations and understanding between our countries. I am convinced that we will enjoy continued cooperation in such a spirit this year, too. I now invite you to join me in raising your glasses to a united Europe, to your own countries, to Slovenia, to the prosperity of humankind, to peace, to our common future in security, to international friendship and to a brighter future for all of us.