Prime Minister Janez Jansa on Monday rejected accusations that the Slovenian government was trying to interfere in Finnish media, saying that through its request to Finnish public broadcaster YLE to also present its side of the Patria story the government was only exercising the right to a correction.
Commenting on the diplomatic notes sent by Slovenia to Finland after YLE carried a report accusing Jansa of involvement in an alleged bribery scandal between defence contractor Patria and Slovenia, the prime minister said that these notes were not about meddling with the work of the media. "It is a fact that it was published on Finnish TV that evidence for a very grave accusation are to be found in a Finnish company 70% of which is owned by the Finnish government," Jansa stressed at an election campaign meeting in Murska Sobota.
He added that the Finnish government was merely asked whether it was in possession of such evidence. The answer to this question came from Patria, which stated that there was no such evidence in the company, Jansa added. While this answers the first note, according to Jansa, the second one was sent because certain Finnish officials commented on the police investigation for Slovenian media, thereby directly interfering in the election campaign in Slovenia.
"It was then established that some are claiming their statements do not match with that was published in Slovenian media...Very few people in Finland speak Slovenian, and very few in Slovenia speak Finnish," Jansa said, adding this opened a lot of space for manipulation. As regards the request for a correction at YLE, Jansa said that the right to a correction was not only warranted in Slovenia, but also in Finnish legislation.
"We were in contact with the Finnish government and their Justice ministry. The request for this correction was issued on the basis of these contacts," Jansa said. He does not know when YLE will publish the correction, he is however convinced it is its duty to do it. The prime minister added he had given two interviews for Finnish media earlier today and that there was no talk of anyone in Finland being upset by the correction request.
Austrian press agency APA meanwhile reported that the Slovenian government's seven-page request for a correction had been denied by YLE, which answered the request today. The broadcaster published only a minor correction online after verifying that former police chief Bojan Potocnik, who had been interviewed in the show, was no longer adviser to the Slovenian president when the interview with him was made.
Except for this information, there were no other statements in the show that needed correcting, the director of the first channel of YLE, Riita Pihlajamaeki, told APA.
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