Slovakia PM Robert Fico In Stable But Serious Condition After Assassination Attempt
The Prime Minister of Slovakia Robert Fico is in a stable but serious condition after being shot several times on Wednesday.
Earlier Fico (59), was said to have been fighting for his life after being shot in the small town of Handlova.
Addressing a press conference, Miriam Lapunikova, director of the F. D. Roosevelt University Hospital in Banska Bystrica, where Fico was admitted, said he was currently in an intensive care unit after five hours in surgery, reported BBC News.
Previously, Deputy Prime Minister Tomas Taraba told the BBC that Fico’s surgery had gone “well” and “I guess that at the end he will survive”.
Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estoka described the attack as a politically motivated assassination attempt.
Fico is said to be a divisive figure at home and controversial in the EU after he called for an end to military aid to Ukraine and sanctions on Russia.
The gunman, who was detained at the scene of the shooting, was in a small crowd of Fico supporters who were gathered outside a cultural centre in Handlova, where the prime minister had been holding a meeting.
The shooting took Fico’s security officers completely by surprise. Footage shows the prime minister after he was shot being carried by several officers, who bundle him into a car and drive him away from the scene.
The gunman fired five shots at close range and Fico was hit in the stomach and in the arm.
Fico was rushed to the hospital in an air ambulance and spent five hours in surgery, conducted by surgical and trauma teams.
Later on Wednesday, the Deputy Prime Minister told the BBC’s Newshour programme that Fico was “not in [a] life-threatening situation at this moment”.
He added the Prime Minister was shot “from very close” and that “one bullet went through the stomach and the second one hit the joint”.
Police have not yet identified the alleged suspect but unconfirmed local media reports say he was a 71-year-old writer and political activist.
The shooting came on the day parliament began discussing the government’s proposal to abolish Slovakia’s public broadcaster RTVS.
Thousands of Slovaks have protested against the proposed reform of the public broadcaster in recent weeks.
Interior Minister Estok accused the media of contributing to the climate that led to the Prime Minister’s shooting, adding that he believed “this assassination [attempt] was politically motivated”.
Slovakia’s outgoing President Zuzana Caputova said something “so serious had happened that we can’t even realise it yet”, in response to the news of the attack.
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