Slovakia’s environment minister, Viliam Turský, is to deliver a report on the sale of emissions quotas to MPs by July 25, opposition SDKÚ MP Pavol Frešo announced on July 8.
Opposition MPs will, according to the contents of the report, decide whether to initiate an extraordinary session of Parliament to discuss it.
"My personal criterion is that if there is a danger, based on the report, that Slovakia could lose more money, I will persuade my colleagues to convene the extraordinary session immediately," declared Frešo. If the opposite is the case opposition MPs said they will wait for an ordinary parliamentary session in September.
"If a group of more than 30 MPs asks to convene a session, [parliamentary] chairman [Pavol Paška] will proceed in line with the rules of procedure, and if the proposal fulfils all formalities, he will convene the session within seven days," said Paška's spokesman, Jozef Plško.
Parliament has bound Turský to submit a report to MPs on the basis of a resolution proposed by Frešo. The agreement signed between the Environment Ministry and Interblue Group last year – in which Slovakia sold its surplus carbon-dioxide emission quotas – may be retroactively adjusted, Environment Minister Viliam Turský said on Wednesday, July 8, after a Government session in Bánov (Nitra Region).
"I can't say that I'm about to change something immediately. That's a question for further negotiations with the company," Turský said, adding that the sale won't be carried out through a direct sale, but all other possibilities are available. The current issue of the Trend weekly reports that Interblue Group has already sold the purchased quotas to Japan. Turský said that he doesn't have information implying that Interblue Group would profit from the sale.
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
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