While the Slovenian WWII Resistance Movement fought for the nation's survival and invaluable freedom, the beginnings of Slovenia's statehood started to emerge there and were fully realized with independent Slovenia in 1991, he said.

The speaker is happy that the commemoration for the Pohorje Battalion attracts many people even more than 70 years on; this shows the Slovenians are aware that the memory of the past needs to be preserved because freedom and peace cannot be taken for granted.

Brglez also stressed that since independence, Slovenia had managed to achieve a lot to be proud of, but "we have also lost passion, determination, will and inspiration for new common goals".

He therefore wishes for more unity to build a future on the universal values of brotherly help, solidarity and tolerance to overcome prejudice, ideological divisions and intolerance, which only worsen during a hard economic situation.

President Borut Pahor, several ministers, MPs and national councillors as well as representatives of the Slovenian Armed Forces and the Police Force were among some 1,000 people who attended the ceremony on Osankarica in the Pohorje hills (NE).

The ceremony there is held annually to remember 8 January 1943, when the entire Pohorje Battalion, numbering 69 soldiers, was killed after being attacked by some 2,000 German soldiers.

The Slovenian fighters were buried in Graz, Austria, where they remain to this day. In 1959, a memorial was erected on the site of the battalion's last battle, while last June, the Alenka Bratušek government declared the site a cultural monuments of national importance.