Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico spoke today for the first time since he was seriously wounded in an assassination three weeks ago, saying that he does not hate the attacker, that he forgives him and that he does not plan to prosecute him.
Fico assessed that the assassin was a “messenger of evil and political hatred” and warned that “the right to a different opinion seems to have ceased to exist in the European Union”.
Ahead of this week’s European Parliament elections, Fico addressed the public in a recorded speech posted online.
Slovakia’s prime minister said he had serious health consequences from the attack and would not be returning to work for the next few weeks.
On May 15, in the town of Handlova, northeast of Bratislava, Fica was hit in the stomach by four bullets from a pistol while he was greeting supporters. The attacker was immediately arrested.
He estimated that he was attacked because of his pro-Russian attitude towards Russia’s war against Ukraine and others in which he drastically differs from the point of view of the “European mainstream”.
Fico was discharged from the hospital in Banska Bistrica last week and is now recovering at home in Bratislava.
Before the assassination, his government had sparked huge protests with efforts to change public information regulations, and was criticized for trying to take complete control of public television and radio. That, along with his plans to amend the criminal code to eliminate the existence of a special prosecutor for political corruption, has led his opponents to conclude that Slovakia is moving towards an autocratic model of government, Beta writes.
Photo: FB Robert Fico
