On Friday, SDSM Organisational Secretary Martin Kostovski urged Pance Toskovski and Aleksandar Janev to resign as the Interior Minister and Public Security Bureau Director, respectively, over the incidents, including the desecration of the national flag, during Thursday’s celebrations of Albanian Flag Day in North Macedonia.
“Today, Toskovski, instead of liability, said at the press-conference that police had reacted properly and timely. If that had been the case, Toskovski should then answer why the Ministry hadn’t had timely operational information in order to act preventively and not allow this, what work is done by the Agency for National Security and Public Security Bureau, how it the situation escalating to this point was allowed, why they allowed such humiliations of Macedonians and the Macedonian state.
Also, why those that opened fire and used firearms in the centre of Skopje haven’t been detained? He didn’t answer this question. The Macedonian flag was burned, while, also, fire was being opened from automatic weapons, which constitutes not only a crime, but also a threat to the safety of citizens,” he noted.
In response, VMRO-DPMNE said that those responsible for the incidents had immediately been deprived of liberty by the Interior Ministry. The party also said that during its time in power, SDSM, with Oliver Spasovski as the then-Interior Minister, hadn’t managed to deal with the “rule of crime”.
In a separate press-release, Hristijan Mickoski’s party also said that SDSM and DUI were organising “dark scenarios for ethnic conflicts” and instigating groups to rampage and instil discord.
“All their instruments and minions that will attempt to violate order will be held liable. Neither DUI nor Ahmeti are above the law. Instead of protests, because DUI don’t have the power for protests, we’ve gotten a cowardly scenario for ethnic divisions and conflicts. You will lose this time around too,” VMRO-DPMNE added.
Furthermore, at a press-conference, VMRO-DPMNE MP Brane Petrusevski said the “rampaging of several groups” was part of a scenario devised by SDSM and DUI to cause an ethnic conflict through which the two parties wanted to come to power.