Throughout his life, Alfred Brežnik - Fredi, an electrical engineer, a businessman and a long-term Honorary Consul General of the Republic of Slovenia in New South Wales, Australia, has been promoting Slovenianness and his home country with dedication and sacrifice. He moved to Australia in 1959. Together with other compatriots in Australia, Brežnik was particularly active during Slovenia’s independence process. Prior to that, he held intensive discussions with Australian politicians regarding the recognition of Slovenian independence. And also thanks to him, Australia was the first overseas country to acknowledge Slovenia as an independent state in January 1992.

David Sipoš is known to the Slovenian public as a film-maker and director of documentary feature films. He is a recipient of several national and international film festival awards.

Celebrating the 30th anniversary of Slovenia’s independence, we asked famous Slovenians what this anniversary means to them, whether they might remember certain events from that time – provided they were alive back then – whether their parents told stories of that period, and what an independent Slovenia means to them.

On 27 June 1991, Zoran Dernovšek, member of the Territorial Defence of the Republic of Slovenia and a skilful operator of the Strela 2M anti-aircraft missile system, shot down the first enemy helicopter during the conflict in former Yugoslavia. Thirty years later, he remembers that fateful day when he shot down the Yugoslav People's Army helicopter. It was undoubtedly one of the most important events of that time, and was crucial to Slovenia gaining independence.

»We were the first generation to go to the army after secondary school, we went to university only after completing our military service,« recalls the current Minister of the Interior, Aleš Hojs, who was drafted into the Territorial Defence several times during his studies to participate in military exercises. He was drafted during the war for Slovenia, but as he points out, he more or less spent it waiting and did not take up arms, as there were not enough weapons because Slovenia had been disarmed. »It was then that we actually experienced how the whole nation, both those who were under arms and those who were not, stood up to get their own country,« he added.