Idrizovo

Boskoski, who has spent five years in jail for the illegal financing of his political campaign, became eligible for early release from Tuesday on the basis of good behaviour. 

But it remained unclear if he would get out of jail on time to join the campaign for the pre-term parliamentary elections on June 5, as his release depends on the prison governor's approval.

Families of prisoners and activists demanding an amnesty blocked traffic in front of parliament on Monday, demanding the scrapping or reduction of sentences for less serious offences.

They said they aimed to gather 10,000 signatures to submit an amnesty bill to that would pardon inmates convicted of lesser crimes who have served 40 per cent of their sentences.

Amid a heavy police presence in a Skopje courtroom full of friends and relatives of the six alleged ethnic Albanian Muslim extremists who were sentenced to life in prison for terrorism over the killings, judge Liljana Shopova postponed the public hearing until September 11, citing "unfulfilled legal conditions".

Jovan Vraniskovski might be out of prison as early as Monday, December 17, a source from Macedonia's Idrizovo prison told BIRN, after the state prosecution and the Skopje criminal court approved his release.