LOCAL PRESS

 

UN SC session on Kosovo, Nikolic to meet with Ban (Radio Serbia)

The UN Security Council is to hold a session on Tuesday at which the latest report of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon on the situation in Kosovo will be discussed and Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic as well will be addressing the session. He said he would ask Ban to organize a donors’ conference for the overhaul of the consequences of floods in Serbia. In his regular trimestral report on Kosovo, Ban assessed there were still challenges in the implementation of some provisions of the Brussels agreement, especially in relation to the formation of a Union of Serb Municipalities.

 

Defense Minister sees off Serbian peacekeepers to Lebanon (Tanjug)

A unit of 130 Serbian peacekeepers was seen off today for the peacekeeping operation in Lebanon at a ceremony at which Serbian Defense Minister Bratislav Gasic presented Major Goran Roganovic with a Serbian flag at the “Stefan Nemanja” barracks in Raska. The infantry unit of the 21^st infantry battalion of the 2^nd brigade of the Land Army, commanded by Major Roganovic, is the second unit of this rank that is being sent to the UNIFIL Mission in Lebanon, where they are to replace the unit of the 3^rd brigade of the Land Army and remain for six months within the Spanish contingent in the mission of preserving peace. Addressing the soldiers, as well as members of their families, Minister Gasic pointed out that the Serbian Army members represent Serbia and its army in the best possible light all over the world, namely in Lebanon, Cyprus, Liberia, Congo, the Ivory Coast and also before members of armed forces of other countries.

 

Djuric heading the Office for Kosovo and Metohija (Tanjug)

The Serbian government appointed at today’s session Marko Djuric, former presidential advisor for foreign policy, as the Head of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija. The government appointed Milosav Milickovic and Aleksandar Nikolic as the state secretaries in the Interior Ministry, the government Office for Media Relations announced. Dejan Ristic was appointed the state secretary in the Ministry of Culture.

 

Contest for admission to the Kosovo police (RTS/Tanjug)

The Head of Operations of the Kosovo police Zeljko Bojic said police opened a competition for new officers. Bojic told Tanjug that the contest is open until 9 June, and that interested candidates aged between 18 and 30 years can apply to the nearest police station. “Forms for admission to the Kosovo Police are in the police stations,” said Bojic.

 

Trial to Drenica Group continues (Tanjug)

A trial before the Basic Court in north Kosovska Mitrovica of seven members of the so-called Drenica Group of the former paramilitary Albanian Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), who are accused of war crimes, has continued, and three fugitive members of the group showed up before the judge on Friday. According to a statement by the Kosovo police, they were arrested by order of a judge of the Basic Court of Pristina Thursday night and were brought to court under tight security measures. The former commander of the KLA’s Drenica operational zone and current President of the Srbica municipality Sami Ljustaku and Drenica Group members Ismet Hadza and Sahit Jasari disappeared from the University Clinic Center of Kosovo (UCCK) in Pristina, where they had been staying for the last few months, on 19 May. According to their lawyer, they did not agree with an order issued by a trial chamber chaired by a EULEX judge to transfer them to a detention unit in north Mitrovica for the duration of the trial. The indictment was, however, read to the defendants before the trial chamber at the Basic Court of north Mitrovica, and they pleaded not guilty to the criminal offenses they are charged with. Four of the seven defendants, including Sulejman Selimi, known as Sultan, who is a former KLA commander and current Ambassador of Kosovo to Albania, appeared for the first hearing of the main trial on Thursday and he also pleaded not guilty. Seven of the 15 members of the Drenica Group who stand accused of war crimes have been in detention since 31 May last year. All are charged with the criminal offense of war crimes against the civilian population, including torture and abuse of prisoners in a KLA camp in the village of Likovac in the Drenica region in 1998, and the murder of Ivan Bulatovic, a young Serb policeman.

 

 

REGIONAL PRESS

 

Invitation for a meeting of countries participating in UN operations (Nezavisne novine/Srna)

The Representative of UN Secretary-General for political issues for the region of West Balkans Peter Due has invited B&H to participate in the Regional Meeting of West Balkan countries taking part in the UN operations, which will be held in October in Belgrade, and he proposed for the next meeting to be held in Sarajevo. During the meeting with B&H Deputy Foreign Minister Ana Trisic-Babic, Due conveyed the support of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and stressed that the UN would do everything in its competencies in offering aid and recovery from the floods in B&H and the region. Speaking about regional cooperation, Due pointed to Serbia’s example and the recent visit of Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic to B&H, which will contribute to increasingly better relations between B&H and Serbia, but also among all other countries of the region. He commended the important engagement of B&H soldiers in the UN peacekeeping operations in supporting peace. Babic acquainted Due with the present situation in B&H, especially in the areas affected by floods of unprecedented scales. She pointed to the solidarity of the people in B&H and the entire region during and after the large floods, the B&H Foreign Ministry announced. Babic acquainted Due with the present political situation in B&H, noting that the resolving of the Sejdic-Finci issue will be launched only after the elections, as the condition for B&H’s Euro-Atlantic integration.

 

Covic: Mostar can no longer be a city case (Oslobodjenje)

“Mostar can no longer be a city case, and this must be clear to all,” said the HDZ B&H leader Dragan Covic. He said that the HDZ wants elections to be held on 12 October in Mostar, but no experiments are in proposal to resolve the city, and expedition is not good. He said that a solution for Mostar must be according to standards that respect elementary human rights. In Mostar in 2012, local elections were not held due to the failure to implement the B&H Constitutional Court decision on the electoral law relating to the Mostar city statute. The HDZ B&H and SDA cannot reach a solution, because the HDZ B&H proposes Mostar as one electoral unit, and the SDA is seeking several electoral units that would be municipalities. The Office of the High Representative (OHR) has drafted a framework document connected with resolving the Mostar problem that six parties from the city supported, but not the SDA or HDZ. This resolution envisions three electoral units that would be multiethnic and “transcend” the Neretva. The Principal Deputy HR Tamir Waser said earlier that the document is still on the table and that they are waiting for the consent of the HDZ and SDA. He stressed that elections in Mostar must be held this year.

 

DPS lost elections in Podgorica (IN4S)

According to the processed 100 percent election material, the opposition won the majority of votes at the elections in Podgorica, the Democratic Front (DF) announced. According to DF data, the coalition led by the DPS won 47,05 percent, DF won 28,71 percent, SNP won 14,07 percent, the SDP-Positive coalition won 8,88 percent and the Albanian coalition won 1,29 percent. The election day in Podgorica was marked by numerous irregularities staged by the DPS. The DF leader Miodrag Lekic has stated that the DPS lost elections in Podgorica. “The notorious fact from the elections in Podgorica is that the DPS, with its coalition parnters, lost power in Podgorica. Namely, they don’t have the majority, the forces led by the DF have the majority,“ said Lekic. He called the opposition forces to form the government together. „Forces that fight against crime and corruption, forces that fight for a legal state, we respect them and expect to form a majority together with them,“ said Lekic.

 

INTERNATIONAL PRESS

 

Serbia aims for Sunday restart of unit at flood-hit power plant (Reuters, by Maja Zuvela, 23 May 2014)
SARAJEVO - A unit at the power plant that produces around half of Serbia's electricity is aiming for a Sunday restart after the worst regional flooding in living memory, opening the way for a complete restart.
A 210 megawatt (MW) coal-fired unit at the Nikola Tesla (TENT) power plant will likely restart on Sunday, Utility EPS said on Friday, after the lignite mine that supplies it was flooded.
The 4,000 MW complex has been operating at about 20 percent of capacity since May 16.
The floods left Serbia scrambling for power supplies and facing a year-long battle to drain the Kolubara open cast lignite mine.
EPS said a railway coal supply line, which had been disrupted due to flooding, delivered some 4,500 tonnes of lignite on Friday for TENT from the Kolubara open cast mine.
The utility also said it has installed a steam engine to heat up fuel oil needed for the restart of the 210 MW TENT A1 unit.
"The unit will most likely be reconnected on Sunday," an EPS spokeswoman told Reuters. "This will provide for a gradual return of other units."
TENT A plant has six units with a combined capacity of 1,650 MW.
The question remains when the Kolubara mine can return to full output and supply the 90,000 tonnes per day needed to operate TENT at full capacity.
Grid operator Elektromreza Srbije (EMS) told Reuters that Serbia's average daily power output since the floods hit has been around 67.3 gigawatt-hours (GWh), not enough to cover daily consumption of 79 GWh. Emergency imports from neighbouring countries have helped to fill the gap, mainly in peak hours.
Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic said Serbia needed to set aside between 0.5 million euros ($682,800) and one million euros per day to pay for the emergency imports.
The outages have had a ripple effect in the region, supporting spot electricity prices in central and southeastern Europe, traders said.
Hungarian peak prices for Monday delivery jumped 3 euros to 48.00 euros per MWh while Serbian spot prices traded around 1.5 euros above Hungary.
Energy Minister Aleksandar Antic said Serbia will be able to meet domestic demand only when TENT A returns to the grid and output at its largest hydro power plant complex Djerdap is stabilized.

Civilians banned from Bosnia villages after flood (Associated Press, 23 May 2014)
SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina — Authorities in Bosnia have banned civilians from entering two villages they marked as potential epidemic flashpoints after record floods devastated the Balkan region last week.
Army troops and civil protection teams are also rushing to remove thousands of animal carcasses from flood-affected areas in the next two days. Authorities said Friday the officials are the
Meanwhile, local and international experts have started estimating the damage and should produce a report by June 4. Officials have previously said the recovery may cost billions.
At least 50 people died and hundreds and thousands were forced out of their homes in the floods, which hit large parts of Serbia, Bosnia and Croatia last week.

US sending ordnance disposal experts to Serbia, Bosnia after floods (Stars and Stripes, 25 May 2014)
The U.S. military will join an international relief effort in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where floods have wreaked warlike levels of destruction, the Pentagon announced Monday.
The U.S. is sending civilian explosive ordnance disposal experts to Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina to help survey areas where landmines may have been moved or uncovered by recent flooding, the State Department announced Sunday.
The Quick Reaction Force team from the State Department’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs’ Office of Weapons Removal and Abatement is to arrive Monday to work with Mine Action centers in both countries “to survey landmine-contaminated areas” affected by the flooding, according to a State Department news release.
An estimated 120,000 landmines remain from the Bosnian war, and the recent flooding and resulting landslides swept away minefield warning signs and dislodged buried mines, according to local officials. Officials have warned that the mines could be carried downstream to other countries in the region.
Local demining companies and the Serbian and Bosnian military demining units “are very well versed in regular demining operations, but they will be facing clearance operations in unfamiliar circumstances — assessing large areas, clearing mines from landslides, and conducting underwater demining,” the release said.
Last week, the Defense Department announced it was providing relief items to Bosnia-Herzegovina, including water purification units, cots and sleeping bags, as well as generators and fuel.

Serbian Bloc Eyes Real Power In Kosovo (BIRN, by Valerie Hopkins, 26 May 2014)
Prospect of united Belgrade-backed bloc in parliament raises chance of Serbia extending its influence to heart of Kosovo’s government.
Pristina, Mitrovica
Rubin feels like a typical dive bar you can find in just about any town in Serbia. The white walls are yellowed from years of cigarette smoke and there’s little in the way of decor apart from a few Orthodox icons.
On a recent afternoon, half a dozen patrons, mostly middle-aged men, took in a steady diet of beer and cigarettes as they kept close watch on the TV. A newscast from Serbia’s national broadcaster, RTS, aired scene after scene of devastation from the recent flooding.
There was no discussing a smaller drama playing out across town, the hours of wrangling over the establishment of the new municipality of North Mitrovica, operating under the authority of the government of Kosovo.
Far from the boardrooms of Brussels, municipal leaders of the new predominantly Serbian municipality were hashing out the nuts and bolts of the EU-brokered agreement between Prishtina and Belgrade of April 2013.
The cornerstone of the agreement was bringing North Mitrovica and several other municipalities in northern Kosovo under Kosovo’s government institutions and laws after more than a decade of control from Belgrade.
The sticking point in the meeting was that representatives could not agree on whether to refer to Kosovo or Serbia in the municipal charter.
It took hours of corner powwows — including the efforts of a weary-eyed USAID official— phone calls, and cigarettes in the hallway of the makeshift municipality building, before the assembly members agreed on May 15 on which government to refer to in the statute: none at all. (An earlier draft of the statute referred future cooperation with the Republic of Serbia.)
Because of the disagreement, North Mitrovica came perilously close to having local elections for the fifth time since November.
The episode was minor in comparison to the violence that gripped the municipality before and during the elections last year. But it underscores the fact that an agreement in Brussels can only go so far in bringing Serbs into the fold of the state of Kosovo.
With these new municipalities just barely getting under way, Serbs in northern Kosovo will soon be pushed into the national political arena. Belgrade is making a push for Serbs to participate in Kosovo’s parliamentary elections and vote for a slate of candidates, the Srpska List.
Strength in numbers
The Srpska List brings together formerly acrimonious politicians: those from southern Kosovo who for years were labeled traitors by Belgrade and by many Serbs for embracing the state of Kosovo, and those from the North, who had been part of Serbia’s “parallel” institutions and who opposed any acceptance, however tacit, of an independent Kosovo.
“If we want to stay in Kosovo, we need to be all together, because we are such a small community,” said Srpska List member Vinka Radosavljevic, from Klina, near Peja.
It is unclear just how many Serbs live in Kosovo. A common estimate is about 100,000, around 5 per cent of the population. While few in number, between a soon-to-be-formed Association of Serbian Municipalities and a united stance in parliament, the Serbian minority could wield outsized influence on the government of Kosovo, which many of them do not even recognize.
Of the 120 seats in Kosovo’s parliament, 10 are automatically reserved for Serbs, but there is no upper limit on the number of seats that Serbs can win. In the 2010 elections, Kosovo Serbs won only three seats by direct vote. As Belgrade encourages greater participation by Kosovo Serbs, analysts and leaders say that with sufficient turnout they could get around 21 seats.
In the recently dissolved parliament, a party with 21 seats would have been the third largest party after the ruling Democratic Party of Kosovo, PDK, and the Democratic League of Kosovo, LDK. Such a large bloc could make or break a governing coalition.
Kosovo Prime Minister Hashim Thaci and Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic see full participation from the North Kosovo Serbs as in their mutual interest. Thaci has courted the Serbian minority vote aggressively and in 2011 entered into a coalition with the Serbian Independent Liberal Party, SLS, which is led by Kosovo’s Deputy Prime Minister, Slobodan Petrovic.
Petrovic’s SLS, which was always unpopular in the North and was routed in the 2013 local elections in the South, has accepted a position as number two on the joint list, which has clear backing from Belgrade.
But how the Srpska list will operate, with a mix of the SLS and other leaders who have staunchly opposed Kosovo’s statehood, is not clear.
“Everyone has a right to make mistakes, and it is good when people who made mistakes get back on the right path in the interests of the people rather than personal interests,” Radosavljevic said.
Petrovic also voiced optimism about the two sides working together. “This is the first time that we are working in a transparent way in the interests of the Serbian community,” he told Blic newspaper.
Bekim Collaku, Thaci’s chief of staff, said he hopes there is a high turnout in the Serbian community, though he is skeptical.
“We are interested in a high turnout of Kosovo voters regardless of their ethnic background,” Collaku said. “In this regard, we encourage Kosovo Serbs to use their constitutional right and vote.
“But ultimately, we expect from them to be constructive and make a contribution not only to promote the rights of their community, but also help to strengthen Kosovo institutions,” he added.
Outsize influence
For Vucic, a high Serbian turnout in Kosovo will increase the influence of Belgrade in the Kosovo parliament and be a sign of strength, showing that he controls the Kosovo Serbs. It will also increase his credibility and standing in the EU.
In Serbia’s parliament, Milovan Drecun, president of the Parliamentary Committee on Kosovo and Metohija, said Serbs should participate in the Kosovo elections as this would “strengthen their position and influence of Serbia in the province”.
At the same session, Social Democrat Milorad Mijatovic said Serbs should have as many seats in the Kosovo assembly as possible because it would facilitate a “consistent implementation of the [2013] Brussels agreement, which is important for European integration.”
Nenad Rikalo, a Serbian member of the Central Elections Commission, predicts high participation among Serbs both in Kosovo and Serbia.
“Insofar as 70,000 Kosovo Serbs vote, we can hope to have 20 or more members of parliament,” he told KosSev, a news portal from North Kosovo. “When you add the number of Kosovo Serbs living in Serbia to that, the maximum we could get would be 35 seats,” he added.
Rikalo’s projection, based on an estimate that 200,000 Serbs in Serbia have the right to vote in Kosovo, seems far-fetched, as Belgrade may struggle to mobilize such voters, especially in the aftermath of the recent devastating floods.
But, if it held true, it would mean that a Belgrade-backed slate of MPs would have more seats than Thaci’s own PDK won in the general election of 2010.
More plausible is that Srpska List is courted into a governing coalition, raising the spectre of politicians with a demonstrated loyalty to Belgrade having a say on how Kosovo’s government institutions are run.
Questions of loyalty to Kosovo have also arisen with leaders of the SLS. In 2013, Slavisa Filipovic, then the SLS deputy minister of the Kosovo Security Force, was sacked after being accused of leaking information to Belgrade.
Members of Srpska List are reluctant to speak about potential coalitions, or about which ministries they have their eyes on.
Number three on the list, Ksenija Bozovic, says her priority is only to improve the lives of Serbs in Kosovo, while Radosavljevic says she wants to facilitate more returns from Serbia to Kosovo.
Belgrade’s proxy?
Srecko Sekeljic, a political activist in Belgrade and a blogger for B92, has suggested that the new bloc will give Serbia decisive power inside Kosovo’s government.
“The government in Belgrade would be willing and able to use the leadership of Srpska List as its proxy,” Sekeljic claimed.
Leon Malazogu, executive director of Democracy 4 Development, a think tank in Prishtina, also says the new MPs’ bloc, and the Association of Serbian Municipalities, will give Serbia a foothold inside Kosovo’s government.
“Now, instead of looking like a minority that needs protection, the Kosovo Serbs look like a handbrake for Serbia,” he said.
“But it could be dangerous if getting [the handbrake] unstuck depends on Serbia. Kosovars are not willing to put up with that,” he said. “The probability that we are headed for trouble may be very high.”
Sekeljic doubts that Srpska List MPs will be powerful enough to make key decisions, such as on the country’s next prime minister, but agrees that the idea of Belgrade influencing decision-making raises concern.
“We witnessed a Serbian mayor of North Mitrovica resigning without any reasonable justification,” Sekeljic said. “Many believe Belgrade instructed him to do that, and now similar things could happen in the Kosovo government,” he added.
Malazogu is also concerned by the idea that Srpska List, answering to Vucic in Serbia, becoming a necessary part of a governing coalition.
“If Srpska List is needed for a majority, which Vucic controls, Kosovo basically becomes a Serbian satellite, which is what we fought against for all these years,” he said.
Back at the Rubin bar in North Mitrovica, one patron, Radisa, seemed unconcerned when told that his local authority has formally been established within the republic of Kosovo. An occasional miner at the Trepca complex, he said he hadn’t followed local political developments lately, as he hadn’t paid his Internet bill yet. “I just need a simple life,” he said.
But he also said he saw no upside for Serbs taking part in Kosovo political institutions, even if that means having more power - and he would not vote in the parliamentary elections even if he were paid. “Someone who is a real patriot would not sell himself for money,” he concluded.

Montenegro's Ruling Party Wins Local Elections (BIRN, by Dusica Tomovic, 26 May 2014)
Montenegro's ruling Democratic Party of Socialists, DPS, won in most municipalities in local elections on Sunday.
The party won most votes in 11 out of 12 municipalities, but only in three towns will it be able to form a government on its own.
Instead, it will have to seek support from the Social Democratic Party (SDP), led by the country's parliamentary speaker Ranko Krivokapic.
The outcome in the capital Podgorica was as expected - no party or coalition has an absolute majority.
Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic said that his party is "the great victor" in the elections, and that the results confirm the DPS domination DPS and commitment of the public to continue on the country's EU path.
According to preliminary results, the DPS will hold 28 out of the 59 seats in Podgorica's local parliament. The opposition Socialist People's Party and the Democratic Front together will have 26 seats, while the SDP's alliance with the opposition Positive Montenegro will hold five.
Analysts said the ruling DPS could be considered only a “relative winner”, because it lost its absolute majority in several municipalities and the outcome in Podgorica could lead to a political crisis at national level.
Djukanovic's DPS achieved an absolute victory in the municipalities of Savnik, Zabljak and Danilovgrad. In seven others, it must form a coalition. Besides Podgorica, it needs an alliance with the SDP or the Bosniak Party in Bijelo Polje, Bar, Pljevlja, Gusinje, Rozaje, and with small ethnic Albanian parties and civic groups in Plav. The party also declared victory in Kolasin but so did the opposition.
In most municipalities, the opposition significantly improved on its performance in local elections in 2010, but not enough to take power from the DPS. They have claimed that the elections were undemocratic and unfair.
The opposition SNP won in Pluzine, a town in the northern Montenegro. But in Kolasin, both the opposition and the ruling DPS have declared victory.
Meanwhile, Krivokapic's SDP now finds itself fortunate to have a kingmaker role. Although the party has a drastically lower score than in the 2010 election, a majority in the capital is not possible without it. The SDP will also be the key player in forming post-election coalitions in most of Montenegro's municipalities.
Party vice president and Interior Minister Rasko Konjevic said they were satisfied with the result but it was too early to talk about a post-election coalition in the capital.
The opposition said it was ready to talk with the SDP to form a government in Podgorica. They also offered an alliance to the SDP in other municipalities where there is no absolute winner to send "the DPS into political history".
The leader of the opposition Democratic Front, Miodrag Lekic, said that although the elections were held in the face of numerous irregularities, the forces of change had won.
"The fact is that the DPS lost power in Podgorica because they do not have a majority. The majority is in the hands of the forces that are fighting for a legal state and fighting against crime and corruption," Lekic said.
Sunday's elections were marked by numerous irregularities at polling stations and on electoral rolls, local watchdogs reported.
MANS, a non-governmental organization, reported more than 500 irregularities at polling stations in Podgorica alone. MANS announced it will submit more than 130 criminal complaints for offences against voting rights.
Another watchdog, the Center for Democratic Transition, reported abuses in the election process in Podgorica, including a violation of the secrecy of the vote and a violation of postal voting procedure.
At a polling station in Podgorica, journalist Marko Milacic was attacked. He said that DPS activists, threatening him with a a gun, took a camera he was using to record electoral irregularities. In Podgorica and Danilovgrad, reporters from the independent daily Vijesti were attacked.
Unlike previous elections, this local poll was not monitored by foreign observers.
In most of the towns in Montenegro the turnout was over 50 per cent, according to officials from the municipal election commissions. In Podgorica, which accounts for more than a third of the total electorate, turnout was 70 per cent, the same level as last year's presidential elections.

Macedonia Prosecution Still Mulling Charges Against PM (BIRN, by Sinisa Jakov Marusic, 26 May 2014)
The prosecution in Macedonia said it was still deliberating whether to proceed with the corruption charges raised against Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski, accused of taking a bribe to expedite the illegal sale of a bank.
Macedonia's opposition Social Democrats, SDSM, have submitted a forensic analysis conducted in Serbia that they say proves that Gruevski's own voice can be heard on a telephone recording in which a man was discussing the sale of the bank.
The prosecution in Macedonia says it is still deciding whether to take this new alleged evidence into account, however.
"We expect to reach a decision within a few days after which we will inform the public," the prosecution told Balkan Insight on Friday.
The prosecution said it was still deliberating over whether to start an investigation against Gruevski, or drop the entire case, which dates back in 2004, as obsolete.
Under Macedonian law, a criminal case may be rendered obsolete after ten years if the law does not prescribe more than ten years in jail for the crime in question.
In the midst of April's general and presidential elections, the SDSM accused Gruevski of taking a bribe of €1.5 million to expedite the sale of Makedonska Banka to a Serbian businessman, Jovica Stefanovic, aka “Gazda Nini”, ["Boss Nini"], in 2004.
Gruevski's VMRO DPMNE party flatly denied the allegations.
The opposition produced documents of financial transactions as well as legal papers from Macedonia’s Central Bank that approved the sale of the bank’s shares.
It also released a lengthy telephone recording on which the opposition claimed that Gruevski's voice could be heard discussing the illegal sale.
Following a lengthy silence from the prosecution, the SDSM on Tuesday submitted the forensic examination of the recording done in Belgrade by an "authorized court expert on the field of information technologies".
"The voice matches Gruevski's... We hope that this expertize from a relevant institution will ease the work of the public prosecutor," the SDSM spokesperson, Petre Silegov, said.
However, Chief Prosecutor Marko Zvrlevski on Thursday said that the additional voice analysis had been sent to the wrong address.
"The expertise, so I was informed, was submitted to the Public Prosecution, not to the prosecution in charge of organized crime that is handling the case,” Zvrlevski was cited as saying. “I expect that my colleagues will soon inform me about their decision on whether to act on the case or not,” he added.
Gruevski who has held power since 2006 won the April general election by a landslide, securing four more years as Prime Minister.
The opposition disputed the result as fraudulent and has refused to take up seats in parliament, demanding fresh elections carried out by a caretaker government.