Galevska testifies in Titanic case

The trial over the Titanic case continued on Tuesday. Jadranka Galevska, former Chief of the Administrative Matters Department, said in her testimony in the Titanic case that IDs would be issued illegally, adding that most of them would end up in municipalities where then-ruling VMRO-DPMNE had had the lowest rating. According to Galevska, together with chiefs from other municipalities, she was summoned in 2012 for a conversation with Kire Todorovski, then-head of the Internal Affairs Minister’s Cabinet. They were told that IDs would need to be issued. “At no time did I think something else was happening behind that. From what I remember, then-Interior Minister Gordana Jankuloska, too, shortly entered the room and just asked whether everything was all right,” Galevska said. Around 10 days later, Galevska once again met Todorovski and asked him how the whole process would be carried out. Todorovski said people from Prespa would be coming and being issued IDs, adding that the person for contact would be Munir Pepic, who would come to her personally in order for their telephone conversations not to be wire-tapped. Galevska added: “When I asked him whether that will be backed for us by the necessary documentation he said that would be the case, but that they would be bringing 20-30 persons each. I immediately reacted because that rose suspicious for me. It’s very suspicious for 20-30 persons to enter a room in which there is constant circulation of people, it will be very noticeable. To that, he said: ‘You mustn’t interfere, that’s high politics’.” According to her, it immediately became clear to her that she’d been dragged into a game and that it wouldn’t end. She had big fears about both her and her family’s safety. Galevska added they’d found persons of trust that would carry out the process and that had received an explanation for what it was about. “At the beginning, Kiril would send me, by text, addresses and when Munir Pepic would come, I would give them to him because they were supposed to be registered for the persons that would be brought, 20-30 persons at one address. Already after the second text, I called him and told him it was too much and that it cannot be sustained. Persons would continue to be brought and Munir Pepic would carry an address, the same one for all 20-30 persons that would came that day. Occasionally, I would get interested in what was happening when we counted over 500-600 addresses that had been issued illegally,” Galevska pointed out. As she noted, information about the case was in that period of time leaked to media and Jankuloska ordered control. However, no illegal activities were found after the insight. Among the defendants in the case are former PM Nikola Gruevski, MP Ilija Dimovski, former Pustec Mayor Edmond Temelko and ex-Government Sec Gen Kiril Bozinovski. The defendants are suspected of criminal association, violation of the right to vote and several other crimes.