The trial against Struga Mayor Ramiz Merko started on Friday at the Struga Basic Court for the purchase of the luxury vehicle Audi A6, worth 67 thousand euros. Following the defense’s request for a full inspection of the files, Judge Nadica Mitreska postponed the main hearing until June 3, 2024.
Neither the accused nor his attorney Igor Petkoski attended today’s hearing.
The case files, as the judge clarified in a digital transcript, will be handed over to the defendant’s lawyer on a USB memory stick, which has 27 files in PDF format.
Merko’s lawyer, Igor Petkoski, indicated in a telephone conversation with the media that the evidence listed in the list of evidence from the Prosecutor’s Office was not submitted to his client with the indictment proposal, which is a legal and constitutional obligation when someone is being prosecuted. He explained that due to the volume, the material should have been handed over on the usb stick, but due to technical reasons, the Court could not transfer the materials to them before the trial date, so that they could review the evidence and compile a list of evidence for the defense.
