Slovenia's governing liberals face right-wing populists in a tight parliamentary election

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LJUBLJANA, Slovenia (AP) — Voters in Slovenia headed to the polls on Sunday in a highly contested parliamentary election that pits the governing liberals against right-wing populists in a vote that will decide whether the small European Union nation stays on its liberal course or sways toward the right.

The race is expected to be tight and follows a campaign rocked by allegations of foreign interference that stunned the traditionally moderate EU country.

The vote comes down to two main players: Prime Minister Robert Golob's Freedom Movement and the right-wing Slovenian Democratic Party, or SDS, led by three-time premier Janez Jansa, a populist-style politician and an admirer of U.S. President Donald Trump.

Who wins will resonate wider in the 27-member EU bloc.

Golob's government has been a strong liberal voice in the bloc while a victory of Jansa — also a close ally of nationalist Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán — would strengthen Europe's surging populist groups.

“Although Slovenia is a small Balkan country, the elections taking place there could be seen as another sign of the rise of illiberal tendencies in Europe,” Helen Levy, a researcher at the Robert Schuman Foundation, wrote in an analysis last month.

Slovenian sociologist Samo Uhan told The Associated Press that “the biggest differences between the government and the opposition are reflected in their understanding of global developments.”

Slovenia's top two parties have been running neck and neck in recent polls and analysts predict that no party would have a clear majority in the 90-member parliament, which would turn smaller parties into kingmakers.

The outcome “is completely uncertain, which is nothing unusual for Slovenia as the electorate has always been polarized,” Uhan said.

Further whipping up the divisions have been claims, first made by a group of activists and journalists, that a string of secret video recordings showing alleged, government-tied corruption, aimed to sway the voters.

The allegations further claimed Jansa's party and a private, foreign agency were linked to the recordings, based on gathered intelligence. Jansa has acknowledged having contacts with a Black Cube adviser, but denied the allegations of election interference.

An investigation by authorities so far has said that representatives of the private Black Cube intelligence agency visited Slovenia four times in the past several months, including a street in the capital, Ljubljana, that hosts Jansa's party headquarters.

Speaking to reporters at an EU summit in Brussels on Thursday, Golob urged an EU investigation.

“It is so important not to act now on behalf of Slovenia, but to act now to protect every other state that will come into election process in the next months,” Golob said. “I am absolutely confident that Slovenian voters will be able to recognize that foreign interference is something that shall never be allowed.”

Black Cube didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.

The company, run by two former Israeli intelligence agents, has been involved in a number of controversies over the years, including an undercover operation on behalf of the film mogul Harvey Weinstein to discredit his accusers. It has said that all of its activities are legal and ethical.

Jansa has faced accusations of clamping down on media freedoms and undermining the rule of law in Slovenia during his latest term in office in 2020-22. He has lashed out at Golob's government as a “crime syndicate” and pledged to “take back” a captured state.

A former energy company manager, 59-year-old Golob and his party were seen back in 2022 as a new hope for disillusioned voters. The government, however, has since been shaken by a series of reshuffles, problems with health care reform and frequent changes in tax policy that reflected an air of inconsistency.

Internationally, Golob’s government has taken a strongly pro-Palestinian stance, recognizing a Palestinian state in 2024 and banning top Israeli officials from entry. Jansa, on the other hand, is pro-Israel and has strongly criticized Palestinian recognition.

Slovenia routinely has switched between the two blocks since it broke away from the former, Communist-run Yugoslavia in 1991. The Alpine nation of 2 million people became a member of NATO and the EU in 2004.

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Jovana Gec in Belgrade, Serbia, Josef Federman in Jerusalem, and Lorne Cook in Brussels, contributed to this report.