Macedonia Seeks Extradition of Convicted Priest

“The Sofia District Court has... forbidden [him] to leave the country until further notice,” Ivanka Kotorova, of Bulgaria’s Supreme Prosecutor's Office of Cassation, told Balkan Insight on Friday.

The Serbian embassy in Sofia is to provide accommodation for Vraniskovski while the Bulgarian authorities await receipt of extradition papers from Macedonia. Once they are received, the court has to rule whether they're going to extradite him or not.

Bulgarian police acting on an international warrant filed by Macedonia arrested Vraniskovski on Wednesday. 

Authorities in Skopje want him returned to Macedonia to serve a two-and-a-half-year jail sentence handed down by a court in Bitola in October 2009 for embezzling money while serving as a cleric in Macedonia. 

As Vraniskovski was not present for his trial, the court jailed him "in absentia". The sentence was confirmed by a higher-instance court in July.

While Justice Minister Mihajlo Manevski on Thursday said Macedonia was pressing for his extradition, the Serbian Orthodox Church is seeking his release.

Macedonian police spokesman Ivo Kotevski told Balkan Insight that they had been contacted by the Bulgarian authorities "and stand ready to take over Vraniskovski if they [the Bulgarians] grant extradition".

However, police sources admit the extradition request might founder because Vraniskovski holds Serbian dual nationality and might use his Serbian passport to argue against being sent to Macedonia.

In July 2009, Macedonia's former health minister, Vlado Dimov, also wanted for embezzlement, used his Bulgarian passport to avoid extradition from Poland to Macedonia. 

A source from the Serbian Orthodox Church told Balkan Insight that “Vraniskovski is Serbian citizen and the Church is doing everything in its power to secure his release."

Vraniskovski has been the focus of a dispute between Macedonian Orthodox Church and its Serbian counterpart, which does not recognise its ecclesiastical independence. The more influential Serbian Church refuses to accept this and offers only autonomy.

Macedonia accused Vraniskovski of inciting religious and racial hatred by setting up a parallel Orthodox church in Macedonia loyal to Serbia, later called the Ohrid Archdiocese.

The Macedonian Church saw this as a Serbian attempt to undermine its authority while the Serbian Church complained that the Macedonians were persecuting one of its priests.

The Serbian Church, which has close ties with other Orthodox churches, has blocked the recognition of the Macedonian Church by other Orthodox churches ever since it declared its "autocephaly", or independence, in the late 1960s.

The US State Department, in its latest report on religious freedom, published this week, cited Macedonia’s failure to register Vraniskovski’s church as a legal religious community as a shortcoming. Macedonia's constitution lists only five faiths. The State Department says may form the basis for the unequal treatment for the others.