On Friday, April 18, a first-instance court in the Slovenian city of Celje acquitted former Prime Minister Janez Janša, who had been accused of abuse of office and corruption.
The 66-year-old Janša was alleged to have abused his position in connection with a real estate sale in 2005—during his first term as Prime Minister of Slovenia.
The case also involved directors of two companies that participated in land sale transactions allegedly linked to the purchase of an apartment for the former prime minister in Ljubljana.
The court’s decision in Celje, which cleared Janša and the two other defendants, may still be subject to appeal. “Although this was clearly and obviously a farce from the very beginning, the prosecutor asked for a two-year sentence. Today’s ‘victory’ in quotation marks—our fight is not over yet,” the politician told several hundred of his supporters outside the courthouse.
Janez Janša, who has served three terms as Slovenia’s prime minister and currently leads the country’s largest opposition party—the Slovenian Democratic Party—called the charges an attempt to bar him from participating in the 2026 parliamentary elections.
Back in 2013, Janša was already sentenced to two years in prison for bribery in a 2006 deal involving the Finnish defense group Patria during his second term as prime minister.
