Slim are the chances for the political parties to reach a consensus over the constitutional changes proposed by the Government under which Macedonia, based on an international agreement, can extradite Macedonian citizens to other countries as well as to seek extradition of foreign citizens wanted for organized crime and corruption.

Although opposition SDSM and Demokracia e Re backed the first stage of the procedure at the meeting of the parliamentary committee for constitutional affairs Monday, they stressed that they would not support the proposal unless their demands for constitutional changes were accepted as well.

SDSM demanded that the minister of justice be removed from the Judicial Council and the Council of Public Prosecutors and that privatization-related crimes can never be regarded as time-barred.  Demokracia e Re insisted that the Constitutional Court should decide by the Badinter principle of vote and that the budget be adopted and judges be elected in the same way.

Justice Minister Manevski explained that the constitutional changes were indispensable to fight organized crime better, especially those that misuse their double citizenship.

“All the countries in the region changed their constitutions in this regard. That is the legal prerequisite for concluding bilateral agreements with other countries whereby the international crackdown on transnational crime would enhance,” Minister Manevski explained.

Vlado Buckovski from SDSM criticized the government for having initiated constitutional changes without prior consultation with the political parties. According to SDSM, it is also disputable that this proposal does not encompass the constitutional changes to remove the minister of justice from the Judicial Council, a proposal that all political parties agreed with.

Ermira Mehmeti from BDI said they backed the Government’s proposal.