The chair of the committee, Jožef Horvat, has explained that the above-mentioned agreement was passed unanimously. The National Assembly will therefore not vote on the candidate, contrary to current legal procedures in Slovenia regarding the appointment of judges for international courts, since the procedure would take more than 15 days. The latter is the deadline set by the arbitration tribunal after the resignation of Slovenia's national arbitrator Jernej Sekolec.

Parliamentary parties will sent their candidate proposals by Monday, and then the government will appoint the new arbitrator on its own, in conformity with statutory provisions in the arbitration agreement. Namely, the arbitration agreement is an international legal act and, as such, above the national law on appointment procedures.

President of National Assembly Milan Brglez assured that the government would first try to reach an agreement about the new Slovenian arbitrator with parties of the parliament. According to Brglez, no concrete candidates were brought up at the committee's session.

"I hope we'll find the most appropriate candidate, an optimal one, through dialogue. It doesn't matter if it is ours, yours, whose it is. Taking into account all of the agreements so far, what's important is that the candidate is a Slovenian citizen and that it's the Slovenian government who appoints the candidate," emphasizes Brglez.

The head of the parliament also added there was a possibility of Slovenia appointing its arbitrator before the Croatian parliament discusses the matter of retracting from the arbitration agreement. "By Wednesday these matters will be discussed, Croatia also gave time until Wednesday for the arbitration tribunal to self-dissolve," concluded Brglez.

A. S., G. K., MMC