Stop Persecution - Unprecedented systematic attacks on environmental protection in Slovakia

Unprecedented systematic attacks on environmental protection in Slovakia

Slovakia / 2024

PHOTO: Kiwiev / Wikimedia Commons

Since the parliamentary election in September 2023 and the formation of a new government, environmental activists and NGOs in Slovakia have been facing increasingly more pressure, especially from state officials. This includes dangerous legislative proposals, unprecedented personnel changes at the environmental protection institutions, and threats and attacks against the environmental sector as a whole.

The new government, led by Robert Fico from the left-populist, nationalist, and pro-Russian party Smer-SD, has started to use brutal anti-NGO rhetoric similar to Viktor Orbán in Hungary. Especially politicians from the minor coalition party, the far-right SNS, which is leading the Ministry of the Environment, systematically attack non-governmental environmental organisations. The original candidate of SNS for the post of environment minister, Rudolf Huliak – a climate change denier and member of a hunting association, famous for his attacks on environmental defenders and members of the LGBTQI community – was rejected by President Čaputová. Even under his substitute, the minister Tomáš Taraba, the SNS’s leadership of the Slovak Ministry of the Environment has been and continues to be marked by prioritising economic interests and those of the hunting lobby over the protection of the environment.

Timber, bears, and national parks

For example, the government changed the law to make it easier to cut down trees, which is possibly against EU law and was described as “ecological massacre” in favour of the timber industry. In March 2024, trees were logged in the protection zone of the Tatra National Park.

The Ministry has also allowed hunters to eliminate bears, a task that was previously the responsibility of the specialised intervention teams. Marian Hletko, the leader of the Bear Intervention Team and an expert on large carnivores, was recalled. It was later revealed that the hunting association, which is led by the former ministerial candidate Huliak, was fined as a result of his complaint. Previously, Huliak attacked Marian Hletko in aggressive videos posted on social media, including indirect suggestions that Hletko should be hanged. In May 2024, a draft law allowing the shooting of protected species was discussed in Parliament. The Slovak branch of the WWF has pleaded to Members of Parliament not to vote for the law.

Minister Taraba has removed the directors of several national parks and decided to drastically reduce financial contributions to the parks and ordered the dismissal of around 80 employees, which is paralysing the already severely understaffed institutions. Taraba rejected the creation of any new national parks (including the planned Podunají national park) and Filip Kuffa, the State Secretary of the Ministry of the Environment, suggested abolishing the Malá Fatra National Park.

Drastic changes in personnel

Changes in leadership at the Ministry and related departmental institutions were described as a huge problem by environmental organisations in a joint statement: “With a few exceptions, party appointees have taken over the management positions of organisations that fall under the Ministry of the Environment. Often these are underqualified people with no management experience, people with no experience in the environmental field. Their previous occupations raise doubts about their impartiality or ability to defend the interests of nature conservation in the given position.” The extent to which the minister Taraba launched personnel changes was described by the former State Secretary of the Ministry Michal Kiča as a “personnel massacre”. Most of the new appointees do not fulfil any qualification criteria and selection procedures are taking place behind closed doors. Kiča from the Demokrati party has announced that he will be filing a complaint before the Supreme Audit Office.

The list of replacements in leading positions is very long. For instance, the Director-General of the State Nature Conservation was dismissed and replaced by a local politician and businessman in advertising and construction. The directors of several sections at the Ministry of the Environment were replaced, as well as the director of the Environmental Inspectorate. The director of the Záhorie Protected Landscape Area Administration is to be replaced by the operator of a shooting range. The directors of the Muranská Planina National Park, Veľká Fatra National Park, and Tatra National Park were forced to leave as well. The latter national park was provisionally directed by Peter Olexa, a hunter and forester, until his resignation after it was revealed that he had been convicted of the offence of poaching in the past.

Anti-NGO law – in the footsteps of Viktor Orbán?

Fico’s government is attacking the NGO sector as a whole. The government has proposed a “foreign financial support law”, a change in the Law on Non-Profit Organisations. If implemented, NGOs which receive more than 5,000 euro from a foreign person in a calendar year would have to be labelled as “foreign-supported organisations”.

The proposal is inspired by a similar law approved by Viktor Orbán in Hungary, which was declared incompatible with EU law by the European Court of Justice. According to a statement signed by more than 40 NGOs, the proposal presents a tool of stigmatisation and bullying and “is intended to allow the arbitrary dissolution of civil society associations by the government, which will undermine the basic principles of democracy and civil society.” NGOs which did not pay a fine for not using the label “foreign-supported organisation” could be dissolved by the Ministry of the Interior. The proposal is thus even stricter than the Hungarian law, according to which only a court could decide about the organisation’s dissolution.

The proposal is not only against EU law, but probably also against the constitutional right to freedom of association.

Other controversial legal changes are being discussed, such as a change to the Environmental Impact Assessment Law. Recently, an amendment of the Freedom of Information Act was proposed, imposing unfair fees for accessing public information.

Personal attacks – from anonymous threats to disinformation by politicians

In the atmosphere of systematic attacks on environmental institutions and NGOs, the rising personal threats to people from environmental protection organisations are sadly not surprising. A joint statement from November 2023 reads: “In recent weeks we have heard mainly unfounded accusations against the NGO sector, which further divide society by pointing to Slovakia’s false enemies and distracting attention from the real problems we face.”

The conservationist Zuzana Burdová, a guide in the Aevis Foundation and a member of the Council of the Poloniny National Park, received anonymous threats in October 2023: “Indirectly, a message came to me two weeks ago from a pub in Uličský Krivý, sent through two people after my older brother, telling me to ‘be careful what I do and watch my car so I don’t find it set on fire’. And fabricated threats to have me on videotape as I was ‘off the pavement in their valley and they'’l see me there again!’ So far I haven’t got that footage because it doesn’t exist,” said Burdová.

BROZ (the Bratislava Regional Conservation Organisation) is another NGO that is under attack, mainly by government politicians. Pavol Littera, vice-chair of BROZ, has said that BROZ was being threatened mainly on social media. Conservation projects of BROZ were already targeted in autumn 2023 during the election campaign. The candidate to be Minister of the Environment, Rudolf Huliak, together with other candidates from the SNS party, attacked conservation projects to paint a picture of “corrupt NGOs” misusing public resources.

Huliak has claimed that conservationists are “tunnelling” the state budget, pointing at projects to improve the environment of endangered ground squirrels and pond turtles. For example, he claimed that BROZ used 5.6 million euros to “observe” the pond turtle. In reality, the project was worth 650 thousand euros (mostly from the EU budget) and aimed at researching behaviour of the turtle and improving its environment.

The attacks on BROZ continued after the election campaign. In a TV interview, State Secretary Filip Kuffa accused the leadership of the NGO, specifically its chair Tomáš Kušík, and vice-chair, Pavol Littera, of having higher salaries than members of Parliament (in reality, they earn only about one third of an MP’s salary).

Similarly, the Slovak branch of the WWF was falsely accused of having ties with the husband of then president Zuzana Čaputová.

Conclusion

In a joint statement on the first 100 days of the new government, NGOs warn that under the new administration, environmental protection is leading to collapse in Slovakia, and the statements of the Environment Minister Tomáš Taraba suggest that this is only the beginning of devastating changes.

Ondrej Kameniar from My jsme les (“We are the Forest”) said: “Constructive policy proposals and their implementation by politicians are often replaced by verbal attacks on the third sector. Politicians who label representatives of NGOs and independent experts as leeches and eco-terrorists are greatly helping to spread hatred in society, the consequences of which we have already seen. They should therefore be held accountable in the event of any violence against us. Experts from non-profit organisations have long been replacing the state in engaging the public, drawing up expert documents, linking ministries, controlling politicians, and all of this mostly for free. The organisations they attack are also replacing the state in nature conservation.”

A statement issued at Slatinka, one of the symbols of Slovak conservation efforts, reads: “Many of us, people from civil society who have been involved for years, either as volunteers or as professional employees, in the exploration and protection of nature, are now labelled as enemies of the state. We are being insulted, accused without evidence, and questioned regarding our motivations. We are made into targets. Yet the associations in which we are active were founded to protect what our fathers and mothers valued and protected.”

The situation in the environmental sector, but also similar dire developments in the cultural field and attempts to control the independent media, has already brought large protests. As of May 2024, there is no sign that the situation will improve any time soon.

Sources:

CZ 19/10/2023 Čaputová nechce ministrem muže, jenž nevěří ve změnu klimatu. SNS na nominaci Huliaka přesto trvá (irozhlas.cz)

CZ 24/10/2023 Slovenská strana SNS ustoupila prezidentce Čaputové. Na ministra životního prostředí navrhuje Tarabu (irozhlas.cz)

SK 24/04/2024 Vláda plánuje uľahčiť rúbanie stromov (aktuality.sk)

SK 07/03/2024 TANAP aj Štefan Kuffa ťažbu dreva obhajujú, aktivisti hovoria, že ohrozuje vzácne vtáky (aktuality.sk)

SK 12/04/2024 Medvede budú strieľať aj poľovníci. Štát sa dohodol s desiatkami združení z Liptova (myliptov.sme.sk)