Just days after being elected speaker of the Slovenian parliament, Zoran Stevanović triggered strong reactions with statements announcing both a visit to Moscow and a referendum on Slovenia’s membership in NATO, turning what was presented in the reports as a political promise into a broader regional controversy. According to the coverage, Stevanović said that his side had promised the public a referendum on leaving NATO and that such a referendum would be held, while also insisting that his position was not aligned with any foreign power. The reports describe this announcement as especially striking given that it came immediately after his election to one of the highest institutional posts in the country.
The articles portray Stevanović as a politician with openly pro-Russian, anti-European, and anti-NATO positions and note that the celebration of his appointment by supporters in front of the parliament building included Russian flags. At the same time, the reports say that Stevanović rejected the characterization that his party Resnica, is pro-Russian, arguing instead that it promotes what he calls pro-Slovenian positions. In the same set of statements, he openly backed a referendum on Slovenia’s NATO membership, while appearing more cautious on the question of a possible referendum on leaving the European Union, saying such a move would likely not be positively received by the public. Even so, he argued that key decisions should be made in Ljubljana rather than Brussels.
The reporting also places special emphasis on the political background of Stevanović and his party. Resnica is described as an anti-system and populist right-wing party that emerged during strong anti-government protests against restrictions imposed during the coronavirus pandemic. One of the central points stressed in the reports is that although Stevanović had previously deposited a statement saying he would never enter into coalition arrangements with Janez Janša, he was elected speaker with the votes of Janša’s party, something the coverage presents as a politically significant reversal and as a possible sign of the contours of a future Janša-led government.
Another major element in the coverage is that Stevanović’s announcement appears to lack a clear institutional or legal basis at this stage. One of the articles explicitly frames the referendum announcement as being without real grounding, despite the political weight of the statement itself. The reports, therefore, present the move less as an imminent formal process and more as a provocative political signal delivered from a newly acquired institutional position. That is part of why the reaction described in the articles was stronger outside Slovenia than inside it, with the statements drawing considerable attention in other EU countries, especially in the eastern part of the bloc.
The international reaction cited most prominently in the reports came from former Estonian president Toomas Hendrik Ilves, who sharply criticized Stevanović’s remarks on X. The articles present his response as an example of how seriously people received the announcement beyond Slovenia’s borders. The coverage suggests that the combination of a Moscow visit, a promised referendum on leaving NATO, and Stevanović’s broader political profile transformed the issue into more than a domestic Slovenian controversy, placing it within a wider European debate over security, sovereignty, and political alignment. Taken together, the reports portray Stevanović’s remarks as a highly controversial opening move in his new role, one that immediately raised questions about Slovenia’s future geopolitical direction and about the political forces that helped elevate him to the post.
