More than five years after it was abolished, North Macedonia’s Special Prosecution, SJO, is again the target of attacks by the centre-right VMRO DPMNE, the main party in the country’s ruling coalition.

The VMRO DPMNE disliked the SJO intensely while it was operating, and for strong reasons: its prosecutors brought corruption cases against top VMRO DPMNE officials, including party leader Nikola Gruevski. Some of them were jailed.

The SJO was shut in 2020 after a scandal involving its own chief, but despite this, the VMRO DPMNE this month has fired off a barrage of press releases and statements at press conferences criticising its past work.

They alleged that the prosecutors who worked at the SJO operated “at the edge of the lawfulness”, spent money recklessly and followed instructions from the ruling party at the time, the Social Democrats, about who to prosecute.