Skopje Criminal Court justice Ivan Dzolev said that it has given approved amnesty requests from a total of 12 people charged in the April 2017 incident in the Parliament, including five members of Parliament.
Three of them, Krsto Mukoski, Saso Vasilevski and Ljuben Arnaudov, broke with their VMRO-DPMNE party and voted in favor of opening the process to amend the Constitution and rename Macedonia after the charges were clearly used to blackmail them. They were promptly expelled from VMRO-DPMNE and went on to negotiate the amnesty law with Prime Minister Zoran Zaev. The other two, Ljupco Dimovski and Johan Tarculovski, voted against the demand to rename the country.
Amnesty was also given to Elena Bozinovska, employee in the office of then Parliament Speaker Trajko Veljanoski, who was charged because she was allegedly giving “non-verbal instructions” to the protesters. The charge sparked a broad social media campaign to release the mother of two from detention.
Some of the distinguished artists and protest organizers who requested amnesty, like director Boris Damovski, actor Vlado Jovanovski and social media personality Bogdan Ilievski were rejected by the court. This decision was already announced in an interview by Government aligned prosecutor Vilma Ruskoska. Opera singer Igor Durlovski refused to even request amnesty, saying that he prefers to prove his innocence in court and that he considers himself a political prisoner. Two other distinguished prisoners who refused amnesty are former Interior Minister Mitko Cavkov and Jane Cento – the grandson of Macedonian World War Two military commander Metodija Andonov Cento, who is one of the best known dissidents persecuted by the Communist regime after the war. Igor Jug and Dusko Lazarov also declined the opportunity to ask judge Dzolev for amnesty.
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