The Interior Ministry denied accreditation to the Infomax news site for the visit of US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, declaring them security risks. Aleksandar Mitovski, the Infomax editor who applied for the accreditation, was recently threatened with criminal charges for reporting on allegations linking the Zaev Government with the major racketeering scandals.
While the Government was able to more or less cope with my questions, to obfuscate them and manipulate the public with their answers, I had no problems, they even seemed happy to allow this impression of freedom of the press. Zaev once bragged that we from Infomax keep peppering him with questions, but he still allows us to attend press conferences. But at the moment when the questions became too serious for them, and indicated the involvement of the Prime Minister in the biggest corruption scandal since the independence of Macedonia, then we became a security risk. We were allowed in at the papal visit, or the Stoltenberg visit. The intent is clear – they want to isolate Infomax and label us, and the next step would be to stop us from entering the Government building, Mitovski told Republika.
The Pompeo visit was scheduled for Ohrid, which is already limiting the ability of the press to raise the issue of widespread corruption in the Zaev Government before the Secretary.
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