The Mihailova Case Goes to NATO: Mickoski Blames Sofia, and the Interior Ministry Still Hasn't Explained How She Crossed the Border

Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski says claims that Iva Mihailova's escape was arranged with the authorities have "fallen flat." The answer he offers isn't evidence for the domestic public, it's a performance for the allies: as soon as the investigation into how she left the country is finished, part of the evidence will be shown first to NATO partners, and the case will also be raised with the European Union.

The tone towards Sofia comes without a diplomatic filter. "This failed attempt caused great damage, diplomatic damage to the government in official Sofia, but that's their problem, and our problem is to bring the fugitive from justice, male and female, before the face of justice," Mickoski said. Earlier, in a TV interview, he said that "our NATO partner is today a refuge for convicted criminals."

Mihailova, who holds Macedonian and Bulgarian citizenship, is charged in proceedings before the court in Kochani over a traffic accident on the Kochani - Shtip expressway in which 33-year-old Besim Durmishi was killed. Her guilt has yet to be determined by the court. Her father has already been convicted and, according to the Government, is in Bulgaria. After she left, the Kochani court ordered 30 days' detention for her, and Skopje asked through Interpol for her to be located, arrested and extradited.

Sofia answered with an article of law: a Bulgarian citizen cannot be handed over to another state for criminal prosecution unless a ratified international treaty allows it. Mihailova has meanwhile been hospitalised at Sofia's Pirogov hospital, where, according to her lawyer Nikolay Dimitrov, she will stay for at least another week. "She is not a fugitive, she is not hiding," he claims.

A border that noticed nothing

Here lies the most uncomfortable question, and it isn't for Sofia. The Interior Ministry says the border police system has no registered exit for Mihailova. She and her lawyer say they went through a regular border crossing and had their documents checked. Her travel documents had been confiscated, and the court had restricted her movement. One of the two versions isn't true, and both lead to the Interior Ministry.

If the exit wasn't registered and she's still in Sofia, then the border has a hole. If she went through a check, as her lawyer claims, then someone at the crossing saw her and let her through. The opposition has already chosen its answer. SDSM leader Venko Filipče accused Foreign Minister Timčo Mucunski, Interior Minister Pance Toshkovski and the PM of arranging the escape. "Pance let her go, his border was 'Swiss cheese'," Filipče said, and the party is demanding Toshkovski's resignation.

The timing doesn't help. Mihailova left a few days after Mucunski's one-on-one meeting with Bulgarian Foreign Minister Velislava Petrova-Chamova in Sofia on 8 October. That's not proof of a deal, but it's enough for the suspicion not to disappear with one statement.

Principle or selective memory

If Macedonia goes to NATO with a story about an ally sheltering convicts, it's only logical for someone to ask about Nikola Gruevski, who illegally left the country in 2018 and went to Hungary. Budapest refused his extradition in 2019, and he has final convictions. Asked whether the PM would raise that case too, the Government said to ask SDSM. The European Commission, for its part, told a Macedonian TV station that it does not intervene in bilateral cases.

Skopje has every right to demand that the accused stand before a court. But the credibility of that demand isn't built in Brussels, it's built at the border crossing. Until the Interior Ministry explains how a person with confiscated travel documents vanished from the system, every message to NATO will sound like a complaint filed at the wrong counter. When will the investigation end, and who will sign its conclusion?