Slovenia

Ljubljana – Slovenia’s daily coronavirus count has declined week-on-week for the fourth straight day as 941 new infections were confirmed on Thursday, down almost 18% from the same day a week ago. However, hospitalisations keep increasing and five more patients died.

New York – President Borut Pahor has held a number of bilateral meetings on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly session. He emphasises the importance of dialogue, including with those one does not agree with, which will also be one of the points of his address to the General Assembly on Friday.

Maribor – A major international production, I Saw Her That Night, based on the novel by Drago Jančar and directed by Janez Pipan, will open at the Slovenian National Theatre (SNG) Maribor on Friday. The show was produced in cooperation with the Vienna Burgtheater, the Yugoslavian Drama Theatre and Ljubljana’s Cankarjev Dom.

Ljubljana – Prime Minister Janez Janša appeared on Friday at the session of the parliamentary inquiry commission dealing with the government’s response to the Covid-19 epidemic. He was critical in his testimony of the preparedness of the public health authorities and noted the systemic problems in elderly care inherited by his government.

Central European leaders signed a joint declaration on Thursday saying immigration should not be the answer to the European Union's declining birth rate, while calling on the bloc to keep family policy under national jurisdiction, Reuters reports.

Czech PM Andrej Babis; Slovenian PM Janez Jansa; Hungarian PM Viktor Orban; Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic; Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik; and Hungarian Families Minister Katalin Novak on the stage at the 4th Budapest Demographic Summit in Budapest, Hungary, 23 September 2021. EPA-EFE/SZILARD KOSZTICSAK

Ljubljana – The government has approved a donation of 100,620 doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine against Covid-19 for Bosnia-Herzegovina.

The donation was approved at a correspondence session last night with the Health Ministry announcing the donation is meant as Slovenia’s humanitarian aid to Bosnia-Herzegovina in coping with the pandemic.

Ljubljana – Retail group Mercator posted a net profit of EUR 10.6 million in the first half of the year after reporting a loss of EUR 69 million in the same period a year ago due to property revaluation and writedowns. Sales revenue was down 0.4% to EUR 1.1 billion.

Ljubljana – Residential property prices rose by 4.5% in the second quarter of the year on the quarter before in the most substantial hike in ten years. The value of transactions was the highest on record, official statistics show.

Ljubljana – Consumer confidence in Slovenia deteriorated for the third month in a row in September as the relevant indicator was down by one percentage point compared to August, which the Statistics Office attributes to more pessimistic expectations regarding the economic situation in the country and financial situation in households.