THE accused as the perpetrator of the attempted assassination of the Slovak prime minister Robert Fitzo he said he committed the crime because of disagreements with government policy, claiming he did not want to kill the prime minister and that he regretted his act, according to a document obtained by AFP.

Fico was shot four times last week while greeting supporters after a government meeting in Hadlova, a city in central Slovakia.

He has undergone two operations in a hospital in the city of Banska Bystrica where he is still hospitalized. His condition is “serious but stable”, the hospital administration said today.

The attacker, who according to Slovak media is Juraj Sintula, aged 71, was arrested immediately after the attack by Fico’s security guards. On Saturday, a court remanded him on the charge of attempted premeditated murder.

“During the questioning he stated that he does not agree with the policies of the current government,” according to the document drawn up by judge Roman Puchovski on Saturday.

The document was emailed to AFP by a spokeswoman for the Special Criminal Court in Pezinok, northeast of Bratislava, before which the attacker appeared on Saturday.

The attacker is particularly critical of the Fitzo government for the abolition of the special prosecutor’s office, attacks on the media, the suspension of military aid to Ukraine and its policy towards the EU.

The man “repeatedly said that he did not want to kill xxxxxxx, but that he wanted to injure him and harm his health, that he aimed his gun at the lower part of the torso and that, according to him, he hit him in the lower part of the trunk,” the judge wrote.

“He realizes that he acted in a completely unacceptable way, and that he should not have injured the victim. “She should have given him the book she had prepared for him,” the court document states.

According to the judge, the man regretted his act and wants to apologize to the prime minister.