As emphasized by Ambassador Krmelj, this is Slovenia’s second rotating presidency of the European Union Council. The first was in 2008, less than four years after Slovenia’s accession to the EU, which presented a special opportunity to give visibility and international recognition to the country, but also posed a challenge.

The country enters its second presidency in a context still shaped by the consequences of COVID-19. Therefore, the main objective of Slovenia’s presidency is to strengthen the resilience and recovery of the EU and to tackle the current challenges in the areas of health, economy, energy, climate, and cybersecurity, as well as to prepare for future crises. Under the motto Together. Resilient. Europe, Slovenia will divide its priorities into four areas.

The first priority will be to strengthen the resilience of the EU, recovery, and the increase of strategic autonomy so that in the future it can respond more effectively to crisis situations, which by nature exceed the capacity of Member States and require a collective response.

The second priority will be to address the Conference on the Future of Europe, which, focusing on citizens and their viewpoints, must provide answers on how to make Europe meet the proposed resilience objectives. Slovenia will coordinate and harmonize the views of member states and represent the EU in the conference’s structures.

The third priority of Slovenia’s presidency will be the promotion of the European way of life and the rule of law, with the aim of strengthening the rule of law as a common value and promoting a culture of the rule of law across the European Union through an inclusive debate. In this regard, Slovenia will continue with commitments related to the rule of law, addressing the debate on the second annual report on the rule of law, as well as previous discussions with certain member states.

Finally, the fourth priority of Slovenia’s presidency is to ensure that the European Union remains credible, secure, and capable of guaranteeing the security and stability of its neighborhood. To this end, the Common Foreign and Security Policy will focus on strengthening transatlantic relations, reinforcing the neighborhood policy, with special attention to the Western Balkans, and particularly on the EU enlargement process to reaffirm the region’s clear perspective of belonging to the Union, while maintaining the priority of achieving the full functioning of the Schengen Area to effectively manage migration and advance negotiations on the new Migration and Asylum Pact.

Sofía Alfayate
Communication Assistant, INCIPE