Macedonian opposition leader: End of regime is near

Macedonian opposition leader: End of regime is near

Wiretapped telephone conversations between Deputy Prime Minister Zoran Stavreski and Interior Minister Gordana Jankuloski "about the difficult situation in the Macedonian budget" have been published, according to the Macedonian media.

Zaev - who was last month accused of conspiring with foreign services to organize a coup - said on Monday that these conversations "show why Jankuloska and Stavreski are wiretapped the most by Gruevski and by head of the secret police Sasa Mijalkov."

According to the opposition politician, the conversations "show that Gruevski issued orders to act against the law, to illegally take out millions of loans abroad that have been spent on advertising, monuments and works of art, at a time when salaries of employees in the administration were brought into question."

Zaev "urged the public to focus on the content of the conversations, because from that it will be learned little by little, who was doing the wiretapping ."

Asked whether there was "evidence of possible contract killings," he said he would "not hide anything in his possession."

"I am aware that with such people, if we hide something, they could accuse us. Therefore, we will not hide anything," said Zaev.

Radio Free Europe reported Zaev as saying that "this political crisis is probably the biggest since Macedonia's independence," and describing Nikola Gruevski as pushing the country into ever deeper crisis on a daily basis.

"There must be a political outcome. There will be no legal outcome of this, nor do we expect it," said Zaev and added that "hoped that the prime minister will not think about causing unrest."

"The time that is coming absolutely depends on him. Will he facilitate things for Macedonia and quickly make moves in favor of Macedonia or not. The end of this regime and dictatorship is coming," he said.

Zaev then noted that a legal outcome "could be expected only in a normal state with a normal legal system."

The news conference held in Skopje on Monday was the sixth that the SDSM called to publish documents that it refers to as "bombs" related to a wiretapping affair.

So far the party published recordings of telephone conversations about judges, judicial decisions and the decisions of the Public Prosecutor's Office, the details of the arrest of former Minister of Internal Affairs Boshkoski and the media presentation of the case, the tearing down of Fiat Canovski's Kosmos Center, and eavesdropping of journalists.