Ljubljana, 2 July 2008 – The Minister of the Environment and Spatial Planning, Janez Podobnik, today addressed a letter to EU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas, informing him in detail of the activities carried out by the Republic of Slovenia in the past two years in the procedure for assessing the transboundary impact of two gas terminals in the Gulf of Trieste (an off-shore terminal and a terminal in Žavlje). In the letter, Minister Podobnik points out that the government of the Republic of Slovenia established, in its decision at the end of 2006, the definitely unacceptable transboundary impacts of both envisaged terminals on the environment in Slovenia.
Minister Podobnik further mentions the first, and unfortunately the last, formal meeting of experts from the ministries of the environment of Italy and Slovenia held last year in Trieste, where it was agreed as follows:
Both sides agree about the significance of impacts of terminals on the territory of the Republic of Slovenia;
The Italian side needs more time to examine the Slovenian studies of transboundary impacts and their methodology;
Meetings of experts represent an appropriate form of further communication, and the two sides will discuss other issues at the next meeting;
The next meeting will be held shortly in Rome.
It is evident that the Italian side did not wish to continue with consultations, since the Ministry of the Environment and Spatial Planning has never received any invitation for the next meeting.
In addition to the foregoing, we are surprised that the Italian Republic continued the procedure without our knowledge. This year in June, the Italian Ministry of the Environment formally approved the project of gas terminals in Žavlje, even though almost simultaneously we received the official and/or amended version of the environmental report on the aforementioned terminal.
From the media we learnt that the Italian Ministry of the Environment approved the Environmental Report at the very time we were preparing public presentation of the materials on both terminals and continuation of the formal procedure of environmental impact assessment in accordance with the national legislation of the Republic of Slovenia.
In concluding his letter, Minister Podobnik writes that since we are deeply convinced that the Italian Republic violated the stipulations of the Aarhus and Espoo conventions and the stipulations of the EU law, the Republic of Slovenia requests the Implementation Committee of the Convention on Environmental Impact Assessment in a Transboundary Context and the working bodies to examine the issue and to react. The Republic of Slovenia further asks the European Commission for help in order to avoid future environmental and safety problems in North Adriatic and to verify the non-implementation of EU regulations on assessing plans and projects entailing transboundary impacts and the inclusion of the general public, methodology and consultations.
Public Relations Office
Ministry of the Environment and Spatial Planning
