Amid the ongoing expansion of ties between Taiwan and nations in central and eastern Europe, Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Jansa has emerged as another regional leader advocating for a greater role for Taiwan in the international system.
With Slovenian parliamentary elections in about a month, Taiwan is hardly the only country where Jansa sought to leave a clear footprint.
On Tuesday last week, he joined his Czech and Polish counterparts in Kyiv, where he met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
The visit constituted a conspicuous public high-level show of support for Ukrainians and the leadership of the nation.
Additionally, it sent a strong message of Jansa’s opposition to malicious authoritarian influence in Europe, in particular from the Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China.
Jansa’s January comments about Taiwan-Slovenia ties and his Ukraine visit are indicative of potential adjustments to the foreign policy course that Ljubljana might assume after the elections next month, presuming that Jansa’s Slovenian Democratic Party remains in power.
Calling Taiwan “a democratic country,” Jansa announced that Taipei and Ljubljana are working on exchanging representatives.
“This will not be on the level of embassies. It will be on the same level as many of the EU member countries already have them,” the prime minister said in an exclusive interview with Indian national broadcaster Doordarshan.
While Slovenia has not been broadly quoted as the next country to follow Lithuania’s footsteps, it is important to underscore that Jansa’s statement did not come out of the blue. He has a track record of positive engagement with Taiwan beginning in the 1990s.
Paired with untapped economic opportunities, the pursuit of closer cooperation with Ljubljana could bring tangible benefits to Taipei.
Despite having served as one of the leaders of the Yugoslav League of Communists early in his career, Jansa became one of the main organizers of Slovenia’s strategy against the Yugoslav People’s Army and subsequently served as defense minister.
In the 1990s, Jansa facilitated the establishment of a Slovenian-Taiwanese Friendship Association in the Slovenian parliament.
In 2011, as the leader of the parliamentary opposition, Jansa led a sizeable parliamentary delegation to Taiwan. On that visit, Slovenian legislators met with Taiwanese stakeholders from fields ranging from exchanges with then-minister of foreign affairs Timothy Yang (楊進添) to discussions about cooperation opportunities with Taipei University Hospital and the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy.
Most recently, he urged the EU to stand with Lithuania against Chinese pressure.
“We must show China that we stand with each other, and that we will not let China threaten any of us,” he said.
Yet, Jansa is not an uncontroversial figure.
Der Spiegel, a major German periodical, called him “the Slovenian Trump” — a reference to former US president Donald Trump — while his bellicose presence on Twitter earned him the moniker “Marshal Tweeto” — a reference to Josip Broz Tito, the former dictator of Yugoslavia.
Taiwanese stakeholders should remain vigilant of Jansa’s repeated attempts to undermine press freedom in Slovenia and his seemingly unwavering support for regional autocrats, including Hungaryian Prime Minister Victor Orban.
Yet, since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Jansa’s stance has been conspicuously different from that of Orban. While the Hungarian autocratic right-wing leader banned the shipment and transit of weapons to Kyiv, Slovenia sent rifles, helmets and ammunition to Ukraine.
Slovenian Minister of Defense Matej Tonin underscored the urgency of this donation, saying: “Every day that Ukraine endures raises the chances for peace talks ... and the price of the war for [Russian President Vladimir] Putin.”
While oversimplified narratives of a “like-minded partnership” ought to be avoided in discussions about Taiwan-Slovenia ties, the European nation’s principled stance in light of Russian aggression is encouraging.
Additionally, there are plentiful opportunities for pragmatic engagement between Taipei and Ljubljana, particularly in the economic realm.
The establishment of reciprocal representative offices under Jansa’s leadership would be an important step toward further institutionalization of ties between the two countries. In particular, investments in the high-tech industry would send an important signal about Taiwan’s steadfastness and earnestness in its pursuit of closer cooperation with Slovenia and other EU member states.
As one of the leaders of the robotics industry, Slovenia is well positioned to become an increasingly important economic partner of Taiwan, which is globally recognized as a major semiconductor production hub. There is mutual dependence between the robotics and semiconductor industries.
With the rise of “industry 4.0,” chips serve as an essential enabler of robotic applications, from detecting moisture to defending against hacking attempts.
Moreover, manufacturing semiconductors is highly automated, particularly since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, meaning that demand for manufacturing robots has continued to rise.
Slovenia also supports the responsible and human-centric development and use of artificial intelligence (AI). As one of the founding members of the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence and the host of the International Research Center on Artificial Intelligence, the country is at the forefront of the global effort to achieve AI efficiency.
Considering special government incentives provided by Ljubljana for high-tech sector investments, particularly in connection to research and development activities, Taiwanese high-tech companies would be well advised to consider Slovenia as a potential destination for greenfield investments.
As Slovenia’s Port of Koper stands as the closest connection between central and eastern Europe and the Mediterranean, the country could meaningfully contribute to Taiwan’s efforts to diversify and increase resilience in the global supply chains.
Additionally, cooperation with Slovenian counterparts could also meaningfully spur innovation in the Taiwanese high-tech sector.
Slovenia’s growing interest in the Indo-Pacific region, including Taiwan, can be explained by its experience of several unfulfilled promises of lucrative investments from China.
Similar to other central and eastern European countries, this dynamic fueled dissatisfaction with cooperation with Beijing and had a negative effect on public opinion about China.
The case of Chinese investment in Maribor Airport, the second-largest airport in Slovenia, is illustrative of these dynamics.
Chinese operator SHS Aviation terminated its 15-year concession of the airport in 2019, less than two years since taking over in March 2017.
The plans of infrastructural expansion and inauguration of direct flights to China never materialized.
This state of affairs also has political ramifications.
Last year’s virtual summit of the 17+1 platform, a cooperation framework between China and central and eastern European countries, serves as a case in point. Slovenia was joined by two other Balkan countries, Bulgaria and Romania, as well as the three Baltic countries — Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania — in not sending their respective heads of state or heads of government to the summit, signaling their hesitation about the utility of the format and reluctance to deepen their ties with China.
Amid the newfound openness between Taiwan and central and eastern Europe, it is imperative that Taiwan effectively channels the current momentum into something more sustainable. While Lithuania has consistently proved to be one of the strongest supporters of Taiwan in Europe, it needs to create a broader coalition of like-minded EU member states to support the current policy of assertiveness toward China and amicability toward Taiwan.
Institutionalization of ties between Taipei and Ljubljana, and investment incentives for Taiwanese companies could serve as meaningful steps in this direction.
Marcin Jerzewski is a research fellow at the Taiwan NextGen Foundation and an analyst at the European Values Center for Security Policy, Taipei Office.
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