Ljubljana, Oct 11, 2018 (AFP)
Slovenia's main writers' association protested on Thursday against an anti-migrant short story contest launched by the conservative weekly magazine Demokracija, calling the competition an unacceptable form of "racist propaganda".
The magazine -- founded by the anti-migrant Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS) and which has a circulation of up to 9,000 -- is running a contest for stories aimed at children under 10 to teach them the "danger that comes with multiculturalism and illegal migration".
The Writers' Association issued a statement co-signed by over 140 public institutions saying: "Children deserve human, open and tolerant stories that encourage empathy and do not favour hatred."
There has been an uptick in illegal crossings into Slovenia from Croatia since last year but there are currently only around a thousand refugees and asylum seekers in Slovenia, out of a population of just over two million.
The rules of the contest include the following: "The characters in the story can also be animals as long as the positive heroes are represented by domestic species while intruders or villains should be represented by non-native invasive species."
They also stipulate that the story should teach children that "it is good to live in a traditional family" and that they should only live with their "own species".
An article on Demokracija's website hit back at the criticism: "Whenever you try to preserve your national, cultural and religious autonomy, unity and identity, you are called violent and a racist."
The magazine, whose homepage features several lurid anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim stories, is offering a top prize of 300 euros ($347).
It is part-owned by Hungarian media companies close to firebrand nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
SDS leader Janez Jansa borrowed much of Orban's anti-immigrant rhetoric during the campaign for parliamentary elections earlier this year and effectively evoked memories of the more than 500,000 migrants who crossed Slovenia in 2015/16 -- although all except a handful of them left the country.
However, despite finishing first, the SDS failed to attract sufficient coalition partners to govern and is now the main opposition to a centre-left government.

Sumber : AFP