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Slovenia appoints ICJ head as its representative in border dispute arbitration

Croatian Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic said Wednesday his government desires to withdraw from edge arbitration using Slovenia next facts this one of the judges got broken principles for your worldwide screen.

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“The process has been contaminated…”

Latest developments on the arbitration process represented “severe violations of the provisions of the contract” and that the “process itself has been contaminated”, he said.

“It has to quit”, Milanovic said to the press, saying after a meeting with opposition parties that the decision was a bipartisan one.

On Wednesday last week, Zagreb-based daily newspaper Vecernji list published transcripts and audio tapes revealing Slovenian representative on the arbitral tribunal Jernej Sekolec and Slovenian Foreign Ministry employee Simona Drenik had discussed lobbying other judges sitting on the tribunal to influence the outcome of the arbitration in Slovenia’s favor.

The two former Yugoslav republics agreed to global border arbitration, a deal that allowed Croatia to join the EU in 2013, nine years after its neighbor.

Sekolec and Drenik have since resigned.

While there is no deadline for the panel to report after starting work in 2011, Croatian and Slovenian media reports have suggested it is due reach a decision this year.

Each country was asked to propose a member of the five-member tribunal that would have to be impartial and, therefore, should not discuss the tribunal’s work with their government.

Slovenia has only 29 miles (46 kilometers) of coastline and argues that its access to global waters hangs in the balance as Croatia, with its 1,050 miles of coastline seeks to draw the border right through the middle of the disputed bay. There has been no immediate reaction from the tribunal to the Croatian withdrawal announcement.

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Croatia has also appealed to the European Union over the issue, as the issue concerns two members of the 28-nation bloc.

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