Skopje's district court has passed down a six-and-a half year jail term for Agim Krasniqi, one of the violators of the June general elections in Macedonia.

Krasniqi was sentenced for "organising an armed group and for intent to distract the election process". These are crimes against "the social order and the rule of law," the court ruled.

In addition, six of Krasniqi's companions got six years in jail each and another two got five years and three months.

Krasniqi was arrested by the police on the day of elections. The police found an arsenal of automatic and semiautomatic weapons in the vehicle he and his companions were driving at the time of the arrest.

Krasniqi's defence claimed that he got the maximum possible sentence for this crime because of the political pressure on the court that was allegedly trying to amend the negative image the country received after violence and allegations of fraud marred the June polls.

After the June elections, international monitors from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, OSCE, found irregularities almost exclusively in the ethnic Albanian populated areas of the country.

Senior European Union and NATO officials subsequently urged Skopje to conduct thorough reforms to the election regulations and to make sure the perpetrators of the crimes are punished.

The police initially detained about 80 people related to the violence and irregularities. But the prosecution charged only some of them for obstructing the elections.

Krasniqi is known to the home public from previous court cases where he was charged and then found not guilty for other criminal activities, among them for organising a terrorist group.

He and his group are the first to be sentenced for the June election violence.

In the court in the western Macedonian town of Tetovo, where many of the election incidents took place, currently there are procedures against 42 suspected election violators.

Source: BalkanInsight.com