SaS and PS: Defence Ministry Spends Money Wastefully

Bratislava, October 1 (TASR) - The Defence Ministry is using billions of euros for modernisation of the military inefficiently and spends money on projects that should fall under the remit of other ministries, representatives of opposition Progressive Slovakia (PS) and Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) stated at a joint press conference on Tuesday. According to MP Juraj Krupa (SaS), the ministry's expenditure goes against the consolidation effort, too. "The consolidation measures we have on the table here that the government decided to present say that it's necessary to save €2.7 billion. And then there's Defence Minister and Vice-premier Robert Kalinak (Smer-SD), who has put together some kind of shopping list and all its items are worth a total of €5 billion," he warned. Krupa pointed out that defence in Slovakia has always been underfinanced, particularly during the governments of Smer-SD. He also warned that NATO doesn't include into the tally of defence spending of a country all investments, but only those genuinely related to defence. Krupa criticised the announced procurement of 4x4 armoured vehicles, seeing as one type of 4x4 is already employed by the Armed Forces. Operating two different types is wasteful in Krupa's view and it's not even clear whether future governments could even be able to afford such a decision. This view is shared by PS, as MP Tomas Valasek (PS) pointed out that the Defence Ministry has been spending public finances also on expenditure it really shouldn't, such as hospitals and bridges. The problem, in PS' opinion, are not the investments in security in themselves, but the fact that inefficient procurements might drain too much money from what is really needed for Slovak defence. mf/mcs