Tuesday news digest: Coronavirus import statistics and new rules for travelling in parliament

Controversial abortion law advanced to the second reading, Kičura remains behind bars.

Education Minister Branislav Gröhling is said to be another politician, within a short period of time, who plagiarised his dissertation in the past.Education Minister Branislav Gröhling is said to be another politician, within a short period of time, who plagiarised his dissertation in the past. (Source: TASR)

Here's your overview of news from Slovakia for July 14.

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Education minister's questionable degree

Another member of the current government - Education Minister Branislav Gröhling - is suspected of not having written his dissertation as it should have been.

The minister's work stands somewhere in between a plagiarised and compiled work, with nearly 60 percent of the dissertation being identical with previously written books, including his own undergraduate thesis.

Speaking with journalists, the minister said he would write his final thesis better today.

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I am not saying that the work is super great.

Education Minister B. Gröhling

Gröhling obtained his law degree from the Pan-European University (PEVŠ) in Bratislava. The university, as well as the minister himself, have claimed the work was written in accordance with the then valid rules.

It is the second plagiarism case of the current government, after allegations faced by Speaker of Parliament Boris Kollár, who faced a no-confidence vote recently.

Imported COVID-19 cases: Czech Republic tops the list

As many as 187 new COVID-19 cases were imported from abroad last month, a new analysis by the Banská Bystrica regional branch of the Public Health Authority.

People contracted the virus most often in the Czech Republic, Ukraine and Great Britain. Most patients were asymptomatic.

The analysis looked into the June and early July data.

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Investigation of fighter jet crash concluded

The MiG-29 fighter jet crash was not caused by a technical issue of the machine, but a series of wrong decisions.

Defence Minister Jaroslav Naď , along with representatives of the armed forces, reported on the conclusions of the 11-member investigative committee on Monday.

The committee found 13 partial factors contributed to the crash. When the pilot failed to land in Sliač, he rerouted to Bratislava airport, but the plane ran out of fuel halfway there.

The fighter jet was fully equipped with ammunition that started to explode after the crash, causing an estimated €38 million in damage.

In other news on Tuesday:

  • United Kingdom: Regular flights between Slovakia and the UK should resume from next week, July 20, following Slovak experts' decision from July 13 to put Britain on the list of less risky countries. It is yet unknown if Great Britain will include Slovakia on the list of its travel corridors.
  • New COVID-19 cases: A total of six people tested positive for the coronavirus on Monday. The total number of cases stands at 1,908 as of today.
  • Coronavirus fines: MPs are discussing higher fines related to non-compliance with the self-isolation requirement after returning from the countries outside the list of low-risk countries in a fast-tracked procedure. One of the amendments includes additional checks of people returning from red-zone countries who are to report their return to public health authorities; mobile operators should provide the Public Health Office with the phone numbers of such people.
  • IT faculty tensions: Ivan Kotuliak will remain the dean of the Faculty of Informatics and Information Technologies (FIIT) of Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava. The academic senate upheld him in its Monday vote. In protest to Kotuliak's management, a group of lecturers had announced earlier they would leave the faculty by August.
  • Kičura in custody: The Supreme Court, at its Tuesday's non-public session rejected a custody-related complaint filed by Kajetán Kičura, a former head of the Administration of State Material Reserves. Kičura, currently held in custody, is prosecuted for the particularly serious crimes of accepting a bribe and of money laundering.
  • Changes to the 2020 budget: The parliament passed the amendment to this year's budget, with a new deficit of almost €12 billion, to the second reading. Finance Minister Eduard Heger talks about the need to respond to the pandemic, correct the mistakes of his predecessors and create reserves for the possible further deterioration of economic development.
  • Parliament advanced the amendment that would change rules for abortions written by OĽaNO MPs to the second reading. The MPs will debate the the law at its September session.

Read more on Spectator.sk

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Stock image.

Twice as many Ukrainians work in Slovakia now than before the Russian invasion.


Píšem or pišám?

"Do ľava," (to the left) I yelled, "Nie, do prava" (no, to the right), I gasped. "Dolšie," I screamed. "Nie, nie, horšie..." My Slovak girlfriend collapsed in laughter. Was it something I said?


Matthew J. Reynolds
Czech biochemist Jan Konvalinka.

Jan Konvalinka was expecting a pandemic before Covid-19 came along.


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