NGO InfoCentre, Foundation Open Society – Macedonia, the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights, Metamorphosis, CIVIL, September 8, the Macedonian Centre for European Training, Freedom Square, Contemporary Arts Center, Front for Freedom of Expression and OKNO, express great concern over the increasing attacks on journalists, media owners and civic activists who have critical views towards the government and its policies.

Yesterday’s physical attack of the Vice Premier for Economic Affairs Vladimir Pesevski on the owner of the Maktel portal, Sashe Ivanovski, as well as the statement of VMRO-DPMNE, are a clear and unambiguous indication of the atmosphere of lynching and violence in our society, which is constantly created and reinforced by the government and its supporters.

Pesevski, as a senior official of the Government of RM, should know that his privacy is not the same as that of the ordinary citizen and that at any time and at any place he needs to be accountable and transparent about his work.

Taking all of this into consideration, we demand that Peshevski submits an immediate and irrevocable resignation and we also demand that the competent institutions take all the measures necessary for clarifying and sanctioning this act of violence.

At the same time, we ask the competent institutions to take all the measures necessary for identifying and punishing the perpetrators of all the other attacks on critics of the government, that have occurred in the past several months.

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