Why did the Prosecutor’s Office keep silent about the horror of the 13-year-old girl?

Today, it will be known who will be held accountable for the trauma that the 13-year-old girl lived through for years, who was placed under the wing of the state in the public school for children with educational-social problems “May 25” in the time that their protégé was a victim of rape, prostitution and human trafficking.

Mila Carovska, Minister of Labor and Social Policy, announced that there will be accountability after the three-member commission formed by the MOLSP will make recommendations today.

– We will act accordingly. There is no possibility for someone to be exempt from responsibility – said Carovska this past weekend.

Apart from the disciplinary responsibility of persons in the social center and institution, and the possible resignation of the chairman, civil society organizations and lawyers demand criminal responsibility for the perpetrators. What is unclear is where the Public Prosecutor’s Office went wrong, especially since they sent a detailed report to the girl from the Ministry of Interior – she was reported nine times as missing, and the police filed criminal charges for sexual assault and rape. For a man with initials SH.K, three times older than the girl (39 years old), SVR-Skopje made a special report, and on January 12, it was delivered to the Prosecution. Another report was submitted on November 2 of last year to a competent prosecutor in the PPO Skopje. Just ten days later, instead of being adequately looked after, the shocked girl was taken to the hospital in Veles. Another criminal charge was filed against a particular perpetrator with initials E.U., for the act of sexually assaulting a child. The investigation was extended to other people.

Where did the system that was supposed to protect the girl go wrong? Carovska pointed her finger to the Prosecutor’s Office, although the big question is – what is the role of these institutions when children to whom they need to provide a better life and future, to educate them and care for them, end up as victims on the street.

– Each disappearance of the girl was reported to the police by the institution. After she returned, a detailed record of her testimony was made. If the allegations that the girl makes are proven as facts, which the Ministry of Labor and Social Politics is referring to the Ministry of Interior, and the Ministry of Interior to the Prosecutor’s Office, then we should have criminal responsibility. And this is not happening, instead we have a repetition of the crime. To date, the PPO has not initiated a procedure. This is where the system fails. If the PPO has initiated a procedure, it is likely that the girl would have been saved sooner- said Carovska.

So far, there is neither a response, nor a reaction from the Public Prosecutor’s Office.

The UNICEF representative in the country, Benjamin Perks, stressed that persons guilty of abuse or neglect must be brought to justice.

– Although abuse occurred outside a state institution, the case raises serious questions about how society protects the most vulnerable children – UNICEF said.
The Helsinki Committee, in turn, asked the MoLSP to supervise the institution “May 25”.

For the criminal offense of trafficking children, the sentence is at least eight years in prison. If the crime is committed by force, threatening or misleading, the sentence is at least 10 years in prison.

VMRO-DPMNE also made a statement related to the case:

“The negligence and irresponsibility of the institutions in the case of a raped girl, a protégé of the state institution for child care “May 25″ in Skopje is only a reflection of the inability of the Ministry of Labor and Social Policy led by Mila Carovska.

It is obvious that such a scandal cannot at all spoil the weekend of a minister who, without blinking an eye, announced that the case that shook the public, in which a rape and conceived a girl, then aborted it, would be solved after the weekend. Imagine a girl for whom the state has taken responsibility to care, goes through difficult times, and the minister will not be examining it until the next day, with the help of a commission”, the party said.

Sunchica Stojanovska Zoksimovska

The father was searching for his daughter last year – on television
At the beginning of April last year, the father of R.I. went to television to look for her daughter with a photograph in his hand, after one of her disappearances from the “May 25″ home.

He then said that the girl was 11 years old was missing for a week from the institution, where he left her.

– The people from the home told me that they reported her disappearance to the police, I searched everywhere, but she was nowhere to be found. I did not know where to turn to, the home told me to ‘go to ‘Channel 5’, they should help you’,” he said on television. The girl was later found at Bit-Pazar.