The aim of the sentencing of journalist Aleksandar Mitovski is to scare the rest of the press into not reporting anything negative about the Government, says former Deputy Prime Minister for EU integration Vasko Naumovski. Mitovski, editor of the Infomax news site, was sentenced to six months in prison, suspended over two years, for publishing the key testimony of a witness in the Racket scandal that reveals how former Prime Minister Zoran Zaev was involved in the case.

You can say that the EC progress report is positive but that won’t obscure the fact that the journalists don’t feel free to criticize the Government. Ask yourselves, how many critical questions are addressed to Government officials now, and compare that to the situation before? Mitovski is given a suspended sentence of six months in prison. The goal is to intimidate him, but also teach a lesson to all others who may decide to publish something that will damage the Government. Are these the European standards we talk about? How can we expect to conduct accession talks with the EU? Freedom of the press is the most crucial element of meeting the criteria for any candidate country, Naumovski said.

According to the former Deputy Prime Minister and Ambassador to the EU, Macedonia has never had a Government so unwilling to accept any type of criticism. “They move past it and go straight to punishing the source of criticism”, Naumovski added.