Fatime Fetai

Skopje Criminal Court on Tuesday sentenced Agim Ismailovic, Afrim Ismailovic and Alil Demiri to life in prison, finding them guilty of terrorism for committing the murders of five ethnic Macedonians - a crime that shook the nation in 2012 and has continued to cause inter-ethnic tensions and speculation about political meddling.

This prompted the prosecution to stick mainly to the old forensic evidence and testimonies from the first trial.

North Macedonia's Special Prosecution, rocked by the arrest of head prosecutor Katica Janeva, vowed on Thursday, "Our fight will not stop".

Macedonia's former interior minister, Gordana Jankuloska, was jailed for six years on Monday in a first-instance verdict for "misuse of office", for her involvement in the illegal purchase of a luxury Mercedes in 2012 that the former prime minister, Nikola Gruevski, had used secretly.

Macedonia's SJO on Wednesday said it suspects the leader of the largest ethnic Albanian party in Macedonia, the junior ruling Democratic Union for Integration, DUI, Ali Ahmeti, as well as former Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski, of spending 2.8 million euros on a census in 2011 which they later deliberately scrapped.

Macedonia's special prosecution body has opened seven investigations into, among others, former ministers, MPs, executives and journalists.

At the start of the trial in Skopje on Friday, the court refused to allow the testimony of a witness with a concealed identity to be used as evidence, as well as the audio recordings of wiretapped conversations between former Prime Minister and ruling VMRO DPMNE party leader, Nikola Gruevski and others indictees.
 

Macedonia's Special Prosecution, SJO, said it suspected ten persons from the Security and Counterintelligence Directorate, UBK, illegally surveyed at least 5,827 telephone numbers from 2008 to 2015 - as part of a fresh investigation codenamed "Target," launched on Friday.

The Special Prosecution, which is tasked with probing high-level crime, launched its two latest investigations on Wednesday, focused on alleged abuses of office at the culture and transport ministries.

Macedonia's special prosecution, SJO, says it suspects that four Interior Ministry and counter-intelligence operatives illicitly acquired hundreds of thousands of euros of budget money for procuring and then maintaining telecommunications surveillance equipment for the secret police between 2010 and 2015.