The State Department removed its long standing classification of the Macedonian Governments as corrupt from its annual human rights report. For years on end, the report would cite “credible reports of high level corruption” or similar references when discussing significant human rights violations in Macedonia. This was usually the most serious allegation levelled at the country, and was particularly prominent in the period of the Zaev regime.
“Human rights issues included high-level corruption”, notes the 2018 report. “Significant human rights issues included: high-level corruption and violence against LGBTI individuals” – from the executive summary of the 2019 report. “Significant human rights issues included: violence and threats of violence against journalists, high-level corruption, and instances of violence and threats of violence against members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex community” – 2020. “Significant human rights issues included credible reports of: inhuman and degrading conditions and severe overcrowding in some prison units; violence and threats of violence against journalists; cases of serious government corruption; lack of accountability for gender-based and family violence; and for crimes involving violence and threats of violence targeting lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or intersex persons”, cites the 2021 report, and so on.
But the 2024 report omits this classification, in what could be a sign of acknowledgement for the significant anti-corruption investigations initiated by the new, VMRO led Government. These activities included investigations that prompted the escape of former Deputy Prime Minister Grubi, the head of the state owned ELEM energy company, a crackdown on a major Skopje based Albanian drug running gang and an investigation into a huge oil procurement deal by an oligarch close to the DUI party.
The executive summary of the report cites “credible reports of serious restrictions on freedom of expression and media freedom, including violence and threats of violence against journalists”, adding that “the government took credible steps to identify and punish officials who committed human rights abuses”. The case of assault on a journalist that is cited in the report is from March 2024, under the previous Government, when a female court enforcement official was accused of attacking journalist Furkan Saliu who was recording in her office.
The 2024 report is significantly shorter compared to previous reports – probably due to the restructuring in the State Department, amid expectations that the Trump administration will abolish the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor that prepares these reports.
