BANSKA BYSTRICA: Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico is able to speak on Thursday but is still in a “difficult condition” a day after his shooting, officials said, as police charged a suspect in the attack they said was politically motivated.

President-elect Peter Pellegrini briefed journalists a day after the shooting.

“He is able to speak but only a few sentences and then he is really, really tired... The situation is very critical,” Pellegrini said outside the hospital in the central town of Banska Bystrica. “The doctors asked me to make a really very short visit...”

Wednesday’s shooting has sparked fears for the future in the already deeply polarised nation, as officials drew a link between the political situation and the suspect’s motives.

Police charged the suspect in his shooting with attempted murder on Thursday.

And Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok said of the suspect: “This is a lone wolf whose actions were accelerated after the presidential elections since he was dissatisfied with its outcome.” President-elect Pellegrini, who won last month’s vote, is a political ally of Fico.

Pellegrini called for calm and urged political parties to halt campaigning for June’s EU parliament election.

The biggest opposition party, centrist Progressive Slovakia, anno­unced that it had already done so, and several other parties followed suit.

Slovakia’s political scene has been divided for years between pro-Europeans and nationalist-leaning camps. Disinformation and verbal attacks on social media featured heavily during the latest election campaign.

Deputy prime minister Robert Kalinak said doctors had stabilised Fico’s condition but said it “is still very serious as the injuries are complicated”.

Fico, whose party won the general election last September, is a four-time prime minister accused of swaying his country’s foreign policy in favour of the Kremlin.

Published in Dawn, May 17th, 2024