Trendafil Ivanovski

Ruling party MPs, legal experts and political observers have condemned an opposition demand for all those involved in the April 27 storming of parliament which left some 100, including MPs, injured, to receive an amnesty.

Due to insufficient political will in the country's gridlocked parliament, Macedonia's Special Prosecution, SJO, will probably not get the extension it seeks to the 18-month deadline to raise charges, which in most cases expires in June and July.

Legal and political experts in Macedonia warn that if the Special Prosecution, SJO, is forced to stop raising new indictments in June 2017, as the original deadline predicts, Macedonia's longstanding crisis  will go back to square one.

Without the prospect for justice being done for many alleged wrongdoings, they say the crisis will only worsen.

Preisdent Ivanov told a press conference on Tuesday that he had not consulted any political parties before deciding to pardon politicians facing crime probes - most of whom are from the ruling parties and are being investigated by the recently formed special prosecution.

Several hundred Macedonian anti-government protesters on Wednesday pelted the Constitutional Court building in Skopje with eggs after judges voted to discuss annulling a provision in the law that bars the President from granting pardons.

They say it will open the way for the President to pardon a number of former senior government officials suspected of organising election fraud.