Handing the 2006 Ombudsman's Report to Parliament Speaker France Cukjati on Friday, Human Rights Ombudsman Zdenka Cebasek Travnik highlighted violations of the rights of children and the handicapped as issues that were on her desk most often.

Cebasek Travnik said that court backlogs also presented a major problem, while increasingly more cases were from the area of environment protection, as people felt that pollution violated their right to a safe environment.

Some issues in the report, drafted by Cebasek Travnik's predecessor Matjaz Hanzek, have been on the list for years. The erased (some 18,000 people from the former Yugoslavia who were removed from Slovenia's permanent residence registry in 1992) are still turning to the ombudsman for assistance.

However, Cebasek Travnik thinks she cannot do anything more for them, as the matter is up to parliament to resolve now.

She added that ethnic communities that wanted to gain formal status of minority would be an important part of her work. She is also hoping that during her term, social security agreements with former Yugoslav republics will be reached.

Cukjati said that the ombudsman's calls for adopting adequate legislation are in place. He hopes that the government will adopt legislation on erased and patients' rights by the end of the year, as promised.

Cebasek Travnik also touched on the affair with the SOVA spy agency, saying that the extensive media coverage of the affair was making people more wary.

She said that her office daily received complaints from people who believed they were being followed or that their communication was being intercepted.