Slovakia prime minister: How assassination attempts in Europe are more common than you might think

The attack on Slovak prime minister Robert Fico is the latest in a long list of assassination attempts over the past decades

News of an attempt on the life of Slovak prime minister Robert Fico sent shocks through the international community on Wednesday.

What should have been a low-key meet-and-greet with supporters following a government meeting in the small mining town of Handlova, 93 miles north-east of the capital Bratislava, turned into a nightmare after a man wielding a gun shot at the politician four times, hitting him in the abdomen.

Mr Fico is being treated in hospital, where Slovak officials have said his condition is no longer life threatening. However, his injuries are believed to be significant.

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico is transported from a helicopter by medics and his security detail to the hospital in Banska Bystrica, where he is being treated. Picture: AFP via Getty Images

Mr Fico’s politics have divided Slovakia. Voted to the leadership in October last year, this is Mr Fico’s third term in office, having held the position of prime minister twice before, from 2006 to 2010 and from 2012 to 2018.

He made it clear during his most recent campaign that if elected, he would stop aid for Ukraine and block any attempts for the country to join Nato. His leftist party has also introduced an amendment to the Criminal Code, scrapping the Special Prosecutor's Office dealing with high-level corruption and lowering penalties for financial crimes.

Mr Fico is not the only politician who divides opinion – most do so, to a greater or lesser degree. Yet, the majority, thankfully, are not attacked.

Many high-profile politicians, including Mr Fico, have a significant security detail, even when taking part in a small-scale event such as that on Wednesday.

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Whether all politicians should have increased security protection became a hotly debated topic in the UK after the brutal killing of MP Jo Cox in 2016. Yet, without 24/7 protection, it is difficult to predict when they are most likely to be targeted.

Indeed, many of Europe’s most recent assassination attempts have occurred at times and in places they would be least expected.

Ms Cox’s killer, Thomas Mair, who shot and stabbed her multiple times as she prepared to hold a constituency surgery in a small Yorkshire market town, held far-right views at odds with Ms Cox, who was a politician for the Labour Party. Another British MP, Conservative Sir David Amess, was killed during a constituency surgery three years ago by Ali Harbi Ali, an Islamic State sympathiser.

In 2003, Swedish foreign minister and Social Democrat politician, Anna Lindh, was fatally wounded in a stabbing as she browsed – without security – for an outfit for a TV debate in a department store in central Stockholm. Other attackers have managed to make attempts on politicians’ lives at more high-profile public occasions, when security was likely to be high.

French President Jacques Chirac survived an assassination attempt in July 2002 after an assailant fired a shot at him, but missed, as he was reviewing troops on Bastille Day. Meanwhile, in 1990, just days after the reunification of Germany, German politician Wolfgang Schauble was left partly paralysed after being shot three times at an election campaign event.

Slovakia’s deputy prime minister Matúš Šutaj-Eštok called for “calm” in an increasingly politically divided nation.

“Let’s not start killing each other just because I can’t respect another’s opinion,” he pleaded. Let’s hope everyone heeds his words.