Macedonian Human Rights Movement International
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Young Macedonian dies after brutal attack by Albanians as tensions rise in Macedonia
Sputnik International Sputnik International article with quotes by MHRMI

Twenty-one year old Nikola Sazdovski, an ethnic Macedonian who was attacked by a group of Albanians in Macedonia's capital Skopje ten days ago, died earlier on Monday after being in a coma for almost a week and amid raised tensions in the country, a source close to the deceased who wished to remain anonymous for fear of retribution told Sputnik.

"Nikola passed away this morning at the KARIL clinic in Skopje after being in a coma for six days. He was a friend that anybody would like to have. I only wish the killers will be brought to justice in accordance with the law and punished for premeditated murder," the source said on Monday.

On June 29, three individuals armed with metal rods attacked Sazdovski at a bus stop on the Alexander the Macedonian Boulevard in Skopje. The attackers, who were identified by onlookers as being members of the Albanian football hooligan group Shverceri (Smugglers), beat Sazdovski for five minutes until he did not show signs of life and then fled.

The group is unofficially led by Artan Grubi, Member of Parliament from the Albanian political party DUI. The latter is the political wing of the Albanian National Liberation Army - an offshoot of the Kosovo Liberation Army terrorist organization - that fought a war for secession from Macedonia in 2001.

On Monday, Macedonian Ministry of Internal Affairs spokesperson Toni Angelovski said in a press conference the case has been "expressly” solved and two suspects have been detained. Asked by reporters about the third suspect who is at large, Angelovski said the Ministry is working on apprehending him.

The Ministry originally did not report the incident at all in its register of crimes, but did so three days later after a public outcry listing it as a case of violence rather than murder.

"The murder of Sazdovski has raised the already tense situation in Macedonia," Macedonian Human Rights Movement International (MHRMI) President Bill Nicholov told Sputnik. "Macedonians are now openly terrorized by the US-installed junta of 'Prime Minister' Zoran Zaev in conjunction with its Albanian partners as part of a broader effort to undo the Macedonian nation-state, rename it and make it a territory for the use of NATO and the European Union."

Nicholov explained that Zaev's Socialdemocratic Union (SDSM) came to power after the United States and the European Union exerted direct pressure, suspended institutions and engaged in election fixing in Macedonia.

"After the United States' grotesque perversion of democracy and the rule of law to install the SDSM junta, the murder of Sazdovski comes as the latest example of selective justice in Macedonia - if one can speak of justice at all. Upon assuming power, Zaev freed virtually all imprisoned criminals, particularly from Albanian organized crime, including convicted terrorists who, for example, killed five Macedonians at Smiljkovsko Lake in 2012," Nicholov said.

US Ambassador Jess Baily, aided by other Western ambassadors in Macedonia, have become judge, jury and executioner in Macedonia, Nicholov said, adding that the moves Baily has undertaken via the Zaev junta and Albanians have been to effectuate a federalized, bilingual Macedonia that can then be partitioned between Albania/Kosovo, Bulgaria and Greece.

But as the geopolitical situation in the world changes, this murder and other similar attacks against Macedonians are signs that conflicts are created in the Balkans by the West to further their goals - just like in 2001, Nicholov added.