About 150 protesters gathered in Ljubljana on Saturday to appeal to the Slovenian government and other European countries, urging them to reject trade agreements between the EU and U.S. (TTIP), between the EU and Canada (Ceta) as well as the Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA). Rallies were also organised in Maribor, Koper and Trbovlje.

“Our message to the authorities is that we won’t accept these agreements, we don’t want them, and we expect our government as well as other countries to reject them,” emphasized Andrej Gnezda from Umanotera, the Slovenian Foundation for Sustainable Development, which is part of the Coalition against Secret Agreements, the organizer of Saturday’s public demonstrations. In Gnezda’s view, Slovenian government does not stand up for such serious topics, since it apparently has no interest in this, or is of the opinion that there’s nothing to be done and that the decision does not depend on them. “Apparently they’ll let others decide about this matter,” noted Gnezda.

Another member of the coalition, the Association of Free Trade Unions of Slovenia (ZSSS), is critical of the agreements for two reasons. “The first reason is that everything is being done in secret. Such important things, which would fatefully mark the lives of people who live here, absolutely should not be negotiated under the table,” argued ZSSS’s president Dušan Semolič. Semolič is concerned that such agreements would put extra pressure on the minimal wage, the pension system as well as social transfers.

A. Č.; translated by K. Z.