A gunman shot several times at point-blank range Wednesday at Prime Minister Robert Fico of Slovakia, known for defying fellow European Union leaders, in the most serious attack on a European leader in decades.
Fico was shot after leaving the House of Culture in Handlova, a town in central Slovakia, while greeting a small crowd on Banikov Square. He was rushed to a nearby hospital and then airlifted to another hospital for emergency surgery.
Hours later, Deputy Prime Minister Tomas Taraba told the BBC that Fico’s situation was no longer in danger and that he hoped the prime minister would survive.
The gunman, identified by Slovak media as a 71-year-old poet, was immediately tackled to the ground by security officers.
Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok said at a news conference that Fico was shot five times and that initial evidence “clearly points to a political motivation.” When asked to name the attacker, he said: “Not today.”
The assassination attempt stoked fears that increasingly polarized and poisonous political debates in Europe had descended into violence.
Fico began his three-decade political career as a leftist but shifted to the right over the years. He was prime minister from 2006 to 2010 and from 2012 to 2018, before returning to power in last year’s election. After being ousted amid street protests in 2018, he was re-elected on a platform of social conservatism, nationalism and promises of generous welfare programs.
His opposition to military support for Ukraine, his friendly relations with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and other positions have left him outside the European mainstream. Like his ally Viktor Orban, Hungary’s prime minister, Fico has been a frequent critic of the European Union.
Like Orban and Dutch far-right leader Geert Wilders, Fico has delighted in presenting himself as a bellicose fighter of the common man, an outspoken enemy of liberal elites and a bulwark against immigration from outside Europe, particularly Muslims. .
His critics have accused Fico of undermining media independence, opposed his efforts to restrict foreign funding of civic organizations and called him a threat to democracy. They accuse Fico of trying to return Slovakia to the repressive days of the Soviet bloc.
Fico’s political career appeared to be over after his ouster in 2018, but he found new support last year by promoting anti-LGBTQ positions, attacking the European Union as a threat to national sovereignty, and opposing the continued supply of weapons to Ukraine. .
During his tenure as prime minister, Slovakia became the first country to stop sending weapons to Ukraine, although non-military aid continued.
His return to power last year reflected a broader trend across much of Europe: declining support for center-left and center-right parties that quietly swapped places after the election and agreed on most things.
The shooting was captured on videos, which show Fico, 59, approaching a small group of people behind a waist-high metal barrier, when an older man stepped forward and fired a gun just feet away. distance.
In a video from Slovakia’s public broadcaster Radio and Television, and verified by The New York Times, five apparent gunshots are heard.
With the first blow, Fico doubled over at the waist and fell back on a bench as more were heard. The security officers then shoved him into a black Audi several meters away, and almost carried him to the back door of the car.
A post on the prime minister’s official and verified Facebook page said Fico was in “life-threatening condition.” “The next few hours will decide,” the post said. Government officials did not say what part of his body was hit.
There was no immediate comment from police on the attack, the most serious attempt on the life of a European head of government since Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic of Serbia was assassinated in 2003.
The shooting prompted a chorus of condemnation from world leaders, including President Biden, who called it a “horrible act of violence,” and Putin, who praised Fico as a “brave and determined man.”
Slovakia’s president, Zuzana Caputova, whose position is largely ceremonial, said in a statement: “The shooting of the prime minister is first and foremost an attack on a human being, but it is also an attack on democracy.”
Some of Fico’s allies in Parliament suggested that his Liberal opponents had created the atmosphere for the shooting.
Michal Simecka, president of the Progressive Slovakia opposition party, said he shared the “horror” of the attack but warned against spreading “false information” about the attacker. In a post on the social media platform
Fico resigned as prime minister in 2018, after weeks of mass protests over the murders of a journalist, who was uncovering government corruption, and his fiancée. Protesters said the government was not interested in solving the crime. Several people were later convicted for their role in the murders, but a businessman accused of orchestrating them was acquitted.
The report was contributed by Gaya Gupta, Pavol Strba, Daniel Victor, Lauren Leatherby, Matthew Mpoke Bigg and Matina Stevis-Gridneff.