Archive of articles - June 2002, page 3

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The eye of the needle

SLOVAKIA needs to speed up its asylum application process and stop regarding refugees as exclusively in transit to the West, say officials with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Slovakia.Local groups that deal with refugees say being awarded asylum in Slovakia has become extremely difficult. Out of the 8,151 people who last year applied for asylum, only 18 were granted the status. In 1996, 129 refugees were accepted from a total 415 asylum seekers.Slovakia also lags far behind its neighbours in the number of granted asylums. Last year Ukraine granted 455 asylums, Poland 291, Hungary 174, Austria 1,114 and the Czech Republic 83.

Lukáš Fila 1. jul 2002

Wife-beaters face tough new laws

TASRand 1 more 1. jul 2002

Quote of the Week

1. jul 2002

SDKÚ party purges ranks

PRIME MINISTER Mikuláš Dzurinda continued last week in a series of purges and changes in his ruling Slovak Democratic and Christian Union (SDKÚ) party following a recent public procurement scandal.Deputy PM for Economy Ivan Mikloš on June 26 was named the country's new Transport Minister by President Rudolf Schuster. With less than three months to go before September parliamentary elections, Mikloš, 42, vowed to investigate the affair, which implicated the SDKÚ in corruption in the purchase of 35 lightweight trains for a state rail company for almost Sk5 billion ($111 million).After an hour-long meeting with then-Transport Minister Jozef Macejko on June 24, Schuster had agreed to Dzurinda's demand the minister be fired for what the PM called "interfering" in the tender on behalf of the losing bidder, the French trains maker Alstrom.

Tom Nicholson 1. jul 2002