BUDAPEST / SKOPJE – The winner of the Hungarian parliamentary election, Péter Magyar, hinted earlier this week that he could extradite former Macedonian Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski, who was granted political asylum in Hungary in 2018. The Ministry of Justice of North Macedonia announced on Tuesday that it was taking
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BUDAPEST / SKOPJE – The winner of the Hungarian parliamentary election, Péter Magyar, hinted earlier this week that he could extradite former Macedonian Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski, who was granted political asylum in Hungary in 2018. The Ministry of Justice of North Macedonia announced on Tuesday that it was taking legal action regarding the Gruevski case.
In a press conference on Monday, following his election victory, Magyar stated that Hungary would not become “a dumping ground for internationally wanted criminals”.
“This applies not only to former Polish ministers, but also to Nikola Gruevski. After all, he is the former prime minister of North Macedonia and a wanted criminal,” Magyar said, Radio Free Europe reports.
Gruevski, who served as Prime Minister of Macedonia from 2006 to 2016, has already been sentenced in several cases for corruption and money laundering. He is also suspected of the act of “terrorist threat to the constitutional order and security”, related to the break-in at the Parliament on 27 April 2017, with the aim of preventing the transition of power, Telma reminds.
In November 2018, Gruevski escaped North Macedonia and, after passing through several Balkan countries, arrived in Hungary, where he was granted asylum by the Government of Viktor Orbán. North Macedonia unsuccessfully requested extradition from Hungary that same year, as well as in 2019.
On 14 April, the Ministry of Justice of North Macedonia announced that it would request the necessary documents for all cases related to the person Nikola Gruevski from the competent judicial authorities and prosecutor’s bodies.
“Once we receive the necessary documents from the competent authorities, the Ministry of Justice will act in accordance with the positive legal regulations”, the Ministry stated, Telma reports.
The current Prime Minister of North Macedonia, Hristijan Mickoski, who now leads Gruevski’s VMRO-DPMNE party and served in his government as an advisor, stated that “if Nikola Gruevski appears in Macedonia, he has a final verdict and immediately after he appears in Macedonia, law enforcement agencies will normally secure him and send him to serve a prison sentence that is in accordance with a final decision.”
“We are a government for which all laws apply and a government that must respect the laws and institutions, and normally every person has the right to use the institutions and exercise their rights to file complaints and so on,” said Mickoski.
Opposition leader and president of the SDSM party Venko Filipce has asked the government to immediately send a request to Hungary for the extradition of former Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski.
He also assessed that “all secret business combinations between Orbán and Mickoski may soon be fully revealed”
