Ajnet Vejsel (31) from Bitola was killed while she was asleep. Ten stab wounds with a knife - all inflicted by the same man. Her former common-law husband, with whom she had four underage children, entered her father's house after making sure the old man was not at home. He approached her in her sleep. The woman died on the spot.

The Basic Public Prosecutor's Office in Bitola filed an investigation order against the 33-year-old suspect and immediately requested detention - on grounds of flight risk. The classification of the offence: murder in a family-violence context, article 123(2)(2) of the Criminal Code.

The couple was separated. The woman had returned to her father's house. Four children were left without a mother in a single night. All four are minors.

The question every institution keeps quiet about is simple: was this man known as a violent person before he inflicted ten stab wounds? Were there complaints, protection measures, restraining orders? The system to protect against domestic violence in Macedonia exists on paper - registries, coordinators, social work centres, restraining orders. How many of those links worked in this case?

Immediately after the murder, the prosecutor's office takes action - an investigation order, a detention request, an autopsy, an on-site inspection. The speed deserves applause. The question is why that same speed and seriousness does not appear before the murder happens, when the victim can be protected. One woman every year in this country ends up the same way Ajnet did - killed by the man with whom she shared a home, a bed, or children. The number does not go down.

The femicide in Bitola is not an isolated incident. It is the outermost point of a society that for years tolerates violence against women in the home, while institutions react only when there is nobody left to protect. Four children are now orphans of a mother - and that is the price paid by the whole family, the whole community, when the protection of victims comes down to procedures after the killing.

The prosecutor's office is promising the paperwork - traces have been taken from the scene, there will be an autopsy, the weapon will be examined too. It will all be filed, it will all have a chronology. But Ajnet is not coming back. And her children are not coming back to the life they had before 14 May.