2024-08-22 04:07:28
Today, the border police of North Macedonia did not allow the journalists from the BGNES Agency – Anton Stankov and Velislav Iliev – to enter the territory of the country and returned them.
After repeatedly going back and forth to the building of the Delchevo border crossing /Stanke Lisichkovo from the Bulgarian side – note ed./ the police officer on duty refused to admit the journalists because “he did not have permission from the Ministry of Information in Skopje”. According to BGNES, the same team from the beginning of the year repeatedly visited the RSM without having special accreditations or other types of permits from the Ministry of Information. After a long “check” the border policemen at the Delchevo border crossing point explained to the journalists that “they must first make a request to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Bulgaria, which after assessment , should approach the Macedonian Ministry of Information, which will then decide whether to grant them accreditation”.
On the European continent, similar practices to hinder the work of journalists exist only on the territory of Belarus.
This is not the first such incident of not allowing Bulgarian journalists into RSM. This practice was first introduced during the time of Branko Crvenkovski, and sharply escalated during the previous administration, when dozens of Bulgarian journalists were not allowed to cover the anniversary of Gotse Delchev’s birth. At the time, the motive was “power cut”, but the next day, the interior minister, Oliver Spasovski, awarded the policemen for a job well done.