Two officers from the special police unit were attacked and badly beaten by a group of five to seven attackers, and are now treated at the emergency clinic in Skopje.

The officers were intercepted about 1 after midnight, in Skopje’s Butel, which has a number of Albanian drug gangs operating in the area and has had a share of mafia style shootings over the past years. The attackers also used firearms, but the injuries were all from the beating.

After the attack, some the group fled in a vehicle with Tetovo license plates. Another group of suspected attackers have been detained.

The incident comes days after a machine gun attack on a shisha bar in the Kale area, where two well known members of a drug gang were killed.