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The agreement, reached at the end of last week after days of intense talks between the government and the Police Trade Union of Slovenia (PSS), was signed by Interior Minister Gregor Virant, Police Commissioner Stanislav Veniger and the PSS boss Radivoj Uroševič, who all expressed satisfaction with the deal.

The accord is similar to the one the government signed with the rival Trade Union of Police Officers (SPS) in late May. The main point of the deal is that the budget funding for salaries at the Interior Ministry and Police Force will not be cut in 2013 and 2014.

Police officers will also get a bonus for overtime in the policing of public rallies and demonstrations. The government will supply an extra EUR 600,000 for the project this year and an additional EUR 1.8m in 2014.

The agreement moreover includes a guarantee against redundancies in the Police Force and the Interior Ministry by 1 January 2015. Nor are redundancies planned for 2015 and 2016.

Virant hailed the agreement as a sensible compromise, underscoring that the document brought social peace to the Interior Ministry and was not affecting the single pay system in the public sector as any interference in the system would cause "a domino effect inevitably leading into the budget's collapse".

He said that the police force had saved the money it was being given now itself through rationalisation in recent years, and that the sum secured by the agreement was relatively small considering the savings made.

The minister admitted that separate negotiations with two trade unions had been difficult, so he wished for talks to be conducted at the same table in the future. "What we secured in both agreements, we did for the benefit of police officers, rather than the unions," he said.

Under the agreement, overtime remuneration would be better regulated. The government has also pledged to protect the jobs of police officers who will be made redundant once Croatia joins the Schengen passport control-free zone. The agreement stipulates that police will be patrolling in pairs at night.

The government also pledged to start tackling flaws in the pay system in the public sector and present improvements to trade unions by October 2013. In doing so, the government will also consider the ratio between police pay and average pay in the country as attained in the average of EU countries.

The PSS union boss thanked citizens for understanding police throughout the work-to-rule strike from 11 January. He said union members were satisfied with the agreement and understood "this was a mission impossible". But he also said that they feared everything agreed would be in fact implemented.

Uroševič estimated that the agreement would bring around 60 euros gross extra a month to each employee.

But the rival SPS union expressed reservations about the agreement, noting that it contained quite a few similar or identical solutions as the accord they signed with the government in May.

The SPS union plans to seek an explanation from the government as to whether overtime would be paid exclusive or inclusive of its own agreement with the government, considering that the sum for overtime negotiated by the PSS was by EUR 516,000 lower than the one agreed by the SPS.

The SPS would nevertheless support the agreement if "any point should mean an improvement of the situation of staff at the Interior Ministry and police force in practice", according to a press release from the Union.

However, the release also cited SPS president Zoran Petrovič in questioning the point of such a long industrial action, considering how little the agreement brought as the main pay demands would only be addressed in the years to come.

The accord did not even tackle the adoption of professional diseases rules, which the SPS union said was the formal reason for the PSS-sponsored strike.

Meanwhile, Police Commissioner Stanislav Veniger thanked Minister Virant and PSS leader Uroševič for the effort they put into negotiations, expressing satisfaction that the strike was over and his belief that police work would be even more efficient from now on.