DECLARING ROBERT GOLOB PERSONA NON GRATA SHOULD BE CONSIDERED

BANJA LUKA, AUGUST 10 /SRNA/ - Marko Romić, Secretary-General to the President of Republika Srpska, said that a proposal would be submitted to the Republika Srpska Government to consider declaring /former Slovenian prime minister/ Robert Golob persona non grata and banning him from entering Republika Srpska.

“This is an appropriate and reciprocal response to conduct that has harmed relations between the two countries. Republika Srpska has always been ready for dialogue and cooperation, but expects this respect to be reciprocated,” Romić told RTRS. He stressed that prominent Slovenian tax adviser Rok Snežič had filed a criminal complaint against Golob, in which he set out in detail precisely what officials in Republika Srpska have been saying for the past year - that the ban on President Milorad Dodik entering Slovenia was imposed without any legal basis, was purely politically motivated and constituted an abuse of office. “Dodik has never acted in a hostile manner toward Slovenia and has always expressed his support for and friendship with the country, while Golob applied double standards, because he did not ban Bosniak politicians and intelligence officials from Sarajevo from entering Slovenia, even though they had been found by the courts to have violated the human rights of a Slovenian child,” Romić said. He reminded that electricity from the Ugljevik Thermal Power Plant had supplied Slovenian industry for decades. “Under the 1981 agreements, the Slovenes drew one-third of their electricity from our facilities, and even today we supply them with electricity and repay tens of millions of euros to them pursuant to arbitration awards. We were good partners when they needed our electricity. And then Golob decided to punish us because President Dodik is defending the Dayton Peace Agreement,” Romić said. Romić said they had warned that a hostile policy would have consequences and that businesspeople from Republika Srpska were withdrawing their capital from Slovenia. “And Golob, as Snežič himself points out, has caused irreparable damage to the reputation of his own country. No one can expect our people to do business in a country whose prime minister openly shows contempt for our institutions. Given that awareness of the illegality of this decision is also growing in Slovenia itself, we will submit a proposal to the Government to consider declaring Robert Golob persona non grata and banning him from entering Republika Srpska,” Romić said.