Slovenia’s "Šutar Law" Sets a Dangerous Precedent for Europe

Brussels, 18 November 2025 – The Roma Foundation for Europe expresses deep alarm following the adoption of the so-called “Šutar Law” by the Slovenian National Assembly. Slovenia has done something Europe rarely admits happens inside the Union: it has passed a law that treats an entire minority as a security threat. Allowing warrantless home entry, expanded surveillance powers and military support in domestic policing, the legislation marks a profound shift in how an EU member state defines security inside its own borders.

The measures were drafted less than two weeks after the killing of Aleš Šutar in Novo Mesto, in a climate shaped by moral panic, police deployments and protests framed around “Roma criminality”. What the government describes as a temporary response is, in reality, a political manoeuvre that will reshape the behaviour of states, the calculations of parties and the expectations of Europe’s neighbours. “This is the kind of shift that doesn’t look dramatic on day one, but it changes the rules of the game,” Haliti said.

Laws like this do not reduce risk—they increase it. They widen the distance between groups, heat up the political atmosphere and create conditions where a single rumour, insult or street incident can escalate out of proportion. By racialising security and militarising policing, Slovenia has lowered the political cost of repression across the Union.

The consequences will reach far beyond Slovenia. When a stable EU member state treats a minority as a security threat, every fragile government in the region receives one message: these tools are not illiberal—they are European. And once imported, they rarely remain confined to those already excluded from free and fair political participation for political gain. They expand to migrants, protesters, journalists and anyone inconvenient to the ruling party.

The law also raises serious constitutional and European-level concerns, challenging protections related to privacy, home inviolability, data and communications, judicial safeguards and limitations on the domestic use of the military. At the EU level, it touches on core guarantees under the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights.

The Šutar Law is not a Slovenian story. It is a European warning—showing how quickly fear can become law, how easily a group can become a security category, and how a small country can create a precedent large enough to reshape the entire European project.