President of Portugal, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, begins a three-day official visit to Slovenia today, at the invitation of his Slovenian counterpart, Nataša Pirc Musar.
This will be his second official visit to Slovenia, following the one in 2021, when the two countries took over the six-month rotating presidency of the Council of the European Union.
First up on the agenda will be a meeting with the Portuguese community in Slovenia, one of the republics of what used to be Yugoslavia.
Tomorrow, he will be received by Nataša Pirc Musar at the Presidential Palace in Ljubljana. According to Lusa, the two heads of state are scheduled to hold a joint press conference after signing a memorandum of understanding on tourism.
Also tomorrow, Marcelo will attend a working lunch hosted by Slovenia’s prime minister, Robert Golob, and meet with the vice-president of the National Assembly, Danijel Krivec. He will also visit the biotechnology hub of the National Institute of Biology, take part in the Portugal-Slovenia Economic Forum (reportedly focused on health as well as the auto industry) and end the day with a dinner hosted by the Slovenian president.
On Wednesday, there will be time for Marcelo and Nataša Pirc Musar to take part in a talk with students from the Euro-Mediterranean University (EMUNI) in the coastal town of Piran, and then it will almost be time to return to Portugal, on the day parliament is being dissolved.
Lusa’s report on this visit makes no reference to the pressing issues concerning Eastern Europe right now, but no doubt they will be fairly high on the agenda.
Marcelo is travelling with a ‘business mission’ from AICEP – the government agency for trade and investment. ND
Source material: LUSA
