Jordan Orce Kamcev, one of the leading businessmen in Macedonia, was put on a US Government black list today – the first such case in a matter of weeks, after the Mayor of Struga Ramiz Merko fell afoul of the Biden administration. US Ambassador to Macedonia Angela Aggeler said that Kamcev is on the list because of “corruption, bribery, money laundering and other criminal offenses”. The sanctions affect Kamcev’s property in the US, but also companies and individuals who do business with him. “Corruption has consequences”, Aggeler tweeted.

Kamcev owes his business to his father’s textile holdings that he privatized after communism collapsed. He expanded into real-estate, healthcare, banking, agriculture and media. Originally part of the SDSM party, he cooperated with the VMRO-DPMNE governments as well, and divided the editorial policies of his newspapers evenly between the two sides.
During the Colored Revolution he was targetted by the politically driven Special Prosecutor’s Office over allegations that he bought land at a posh part of Skopje that was actually meant for then Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski. Another large investigation by the SPO targetted Kamcev and the state security chief Saso Mijalkov for alleged money laundering.

This prosecution brought about the collapse of the SPO and lasting damage to the reputation of the judiciary in Macedonia, after Kamcev recorded emissaries of the Special Prosecutor Katica Janeva as they were extorting 1.5 million EUR from him. The money were given in exchange from a promise from Janeva, which Kamcev also recorded, that she will sabotage her own case against him. The Zaev regime had Janeva put on trial, but never forgave Kamcev, and held him in detention for almost a full year, under conditions that his defense team described as very difficult.