Slovakian PM Robert Fico Shot: PM Modi 'Deeply Shocked' Says 'Strongly Condemn Cowardly And Dastardly Act'

5/16/2024 12:00:26 AM

(MENAFN- Live Mint) "Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday expressed shock at the news of the shooting at Slovakia's Prime Minister, Robert Fico to X (previously Twitter), PM Modi said,“I strongly condemn this cowardly and dastardly act and wish PM Fico a speedy recovery. India stands in solidarity with the people of the Slovak Republic.”Robert Fico gravely woundedSlovakia's populist prime minister was shot multiple times and gravely wounded Wednesday, but his deputy prime minister said he believed Fico would survive prime minister had been greeting supporters at an event when the attempted assassination took place, shocking the small country and reverberating across Europe weeks before an election.“I guess in the end he will survive,” Tomas Taraba told the BBC, adding:“He's not in a life-threatening situation at this moment.”Doctors fought for Fico's life several hours after the pro-Russian leader (59), was hit in the abdomen, Defence Minister Robert Kalina told reporters at the hospital where Fico was being treated shots were fired outside a cultural centre in the town of Handlova, nearly 140 km northeast of the capital, government officials said. Fico was shot while attending a meeting of his government in the town of 16,000 that was once a centre of coal mining.A suspect was in custody, and an initial investigation found“a clear political motivation” behind the assassination attempt, Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok said as he briefed reporters alongside the defence minister has long been a divisive figure in Slovakia and beyond, but his return to power last year on a pro-Russian, anti-American message led to even greater worries among fellow European Union members that he would lead his country further from the Western mainstream off his fourth term as prime minister, his government halted arms deliveries to Ukraine, and critics worry that he will lead Slovakia - a nation of 5.4 million that belongs to NATO - to abandon its pro-Western course and follow in the footsteps of Hungary under populist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán have repeatedly rallied in the capital and across Slovakia to protest Fico's policies.

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