Skopje, 17 July 2024 (MIA) – The Parliamentary Committee on Political System and Inter-Community Relations has adjourned until Thursday at noon after discussing Tuesday the 2023 Human Rights Report presented by Ombudsman Naser Ziberi.

According to Ziberi, the Ombudsman's office in 2023 received a total of 2,802 complaints, of which 39.26 percent were regarding human rights violations by public institutions.

People filed complaints of rights violations by the central government (25.73%), the local government (11.81%), judiciary (9.21%), legal subjects (6.78%), other subjects (4.96%) and multiple authorities or institutions (2.29%).

Together with other cases forwarded from other institutions, he said, the Ombudsman's office had processed 3,328 cases.

Ziberi noted that the largest number of complaints were related to legal rights violations (17.42%), followed by consumer rights violations (10.10%), labor rights violations (9.53%), children's rights violations (8.24%) percent) as well as other rights violations.

The Ombudsman determined that most violations, 76, were related to justice.

Commenting on the general situation regarding human freedoms and rights, Ziberi noted an improvement in registering undocumented persons and making it possible for them to access education, employment, and social protection.

No progress had been made regarding the conditions in prisons, which Ziberi said were still extremely inhumane, degrading and below all human dignity.

Regarding children's rights, Ziberi pointed out that North Macedonia has a serious problem with the segregation of Roma students, for which the European Court of Human Rights has rendered a judgment against the state. However, the problem persists.

"As an institution advocating for applying the Convention on the Rights of the Child principles of non-discrimination, equality of children and respect for the child's best interests, we are seriously concerned by the fact that parents of other ethnicities have been requesting to take out their children from [Bitola and Prilep] schools where a greater number of Roma students were enrolled so they could transfer their children to schools where there are none or where the number of Roma students was insignificant," Ziberi said.

Also concerning was that in 2023 the state did not uphold the constitutionally guaranteed right to provide education in the mother tongue for Albanian students in two primary schools in Skopje and one secondary school in Veles, due to the refusal of school management and local authorities.

Another problem he mentioned was street children not having access to education, which calls their development and future prospects into question.

Following Ziberi's remarks, committee chair Ljupcho Prendzhov pointed out that no SDSM MPs were attending the session. According to him, the next Human Rights Report would show visible improvements.

Several VMRO-DPMNE MPs also expressed their concern regarding the findings of the report, saying that they were a consequence of the irresponsible work of the previous government. mr/