AJM: Journalists attacked, and the cameraman from ALSAT was injured; we demand an immediate reaction from the Ministry of Interior

The Association of Journalists of Macedonia (AJM) requests the Ministry of Internal Affairs to conduct a quick and efficient investigation into today’s attack on our colleagues from TV Alsat, Skopje.

Namely, today during the filming of promo inserts for a show in the Skopje bazaar in a public area, cameraman and journalists Era Gjakova and Sara Hoxha were attacked by the owner of a barbershop in the Skopje bazaar.

According to the statements of our colleagues, while they were filming inserts in the bazaar for the needs of the show, the owner, a barber, came out of one of the shops with scissors and addressed them with verbal insults and threats to his life, causing visible injuries to the cameraman’s head.

The cameraman’s equipment was also damaged during the physical attack. AJM immediately contacted the journalist from Alsat, Era Gjakova, who was visibly upset, confirmed the incident, and gave us specific information that: The team with which they were filming in the field was attacked without reason by an unknown person, the situation was unpredictable and very disturbing, especially for the attacked cameraman and also for his colleague Sara Hoxha, who has not been attacked for the first time, “after the attack, the person returned to the store and then left again, but when he saw that passers-by had already gathered to help and that a police team had been called headed in an unknown direction”.

AJM asks the Ministry of Interior to conduct a quick and efficient investigation to find and sanction the attacker.

We emphasize that threats to life are crimes provided for in the Criminal Code, and the Ministry of the Interior and the Public Prosecutor’s Office should urgently investigate and process them to punish those who violate the law also to prevent possible such crimes in the future.