Another point of contention between Slovenia and Croatia.
Slovenia has fulfilled its threat and filed a lawsuit against the European Commission at the General Court of the European Union, requesting the annulment of the Commission’s delegated act under which Croatian producers of the Terrano wine can produce and sell their wine, provided they use labels with the inscription “Croatia Istria”, reports Novi List on September 16, 2017.
Slovenia has protected the Terrano wine even before joining the EU when it labelled it as an indigenous Slovenian product. After joining the EU, Slovenia has transferred the protection of the wine to the European system of autochthonous products protection, and a few years ago it strongly opposed the European Commission’s intention to grant Croatia an exemption for Croatian Terrano producers.
Ljubljana did not give up even when the European Commission issued a delegated act in favour of Croatian producers of Terrano in March this year, after a long process in which Slovenia failed to convince the European Commission that Croatia had falsified its documentation requesting an exemption from the Slovenian protection.
Slovenia will try to prove in the new proceedings before the EU court that this decision was illegal and damaged the Slovenian Terrano producers, although the prospects for success of such a lawsuit are minimal. The European Commission has so far given 50 similar exemptions, some of which are related to products made in Slovenia and protected in other countries.
Despite numerous public doubts about the success of the lawsuit against the European Commission, the Slovenian Agriculture Minister and current Slovenian Social Democratic leader Dejan Židan, who is the most responsible for the Slovenian failure in this case, insisted on filing the lawsuit. The reason is probably the approach of parliamentary elections which will be held by the summer of next year. Židan is “buying” extra time with this lawsuit because otherwise he would have to face unpleasant questions during the campaign.
Although Croatia is not a party to this dispute, nor is it directly involved in it, it is significant for Croatia. In this case, Slovenia is trying to challenge the decision by which the European Commission ruled in favour of Croatia in at least one Croatian-Slovenian dispute. This case also represents a clear message of unwillingness to compromise when it comes to Croatian-Slovenian disputes, this time by Ljubljana, although in other open issues Croatia is not lagging behind in being obstinate.
Translated from Novi List.
