Macedonia Parties Discuss Judicial Independence

The meeting takes place at the initiative of the main ruling centre-right VMRO DPMNE party. This will be the second time that top politicians meet on this issue after their talks on March 11 did not result in a deal.

Local analysts expect that the changes to the country's constitution will include the removal of the justice minister from the Judicial Council, which would help prevent the post of justice minister from having political influence over the Judicial Council's decisions.

In addition, VMRO DPMNE has proposed an increase in the number of members of the council who are elected by judges and a decrease in the number of members elected by the parliament, apparently in an effort to further strengthen the independence of the council.

However, the main opposition party, the Social Democrats, expressed suspicion that there was more behind the proposed changes. Party officials argued that at this moment, when the country must urgently solve its name row with Greece to unlock its NATO and EU integration processes, constitutional changes would only distract public attention from real problems.

The ethnic Albanian New Democracy, ND party yesterday said it will ask for additional changes to the constitution to be made in order to introduce double majority voting in the council.

This is to ensure that the ethnic Macedonian members of the council do not always outvote the ethnic Albanians members, they say.

This principle was introduced in the Macedonian parliament after the 2001 armed conflict between ethnic Albanian insurgents and the state’s security forces. In essence, it means that for certain bills or decisions to pass they must have the support of the majority of legislators coming from the ethnic minority groups.

The talks slated for later today are also expected to be attended by the junior government partner, the ethnic Albanian Democratic Union for Integration, DUI, and the opposition Democratic Party of Albanians, DPA.