Bratislava - Slovak opposition parties, which won a big majority in a weekend general election, said yesterday they wanted to form a government. This effectively dashed the hopes of the Prime Minister, Mr Vladimir Meciar, and his Movement for a Democratic Slovakia (HZDS) of clinging to power.
The four parties, which span the political spectrum, ruled out any co-operation with Mr Meciar. "The participants of the democratic round table expressed a common will to form a new Slovak government," the leader of the Slovak Democratic Coalition and a possible new prime minister, Mr Mikulas Dzurinda, said after talks with the three other parties - the ex-communist Party of the Democratic Left (SDL), the centre-left Party of Civic Understanding (SOP) and the ethnic Hungarian Coalition Party (SMK).