North Macedonia's fugitive ex-PM sentenced a fourth time

North Macedonia's fugitive former prime minister Nikola Gruevski was sentenced to nine years in prison on Friday in a case involving an explosive demolition carried out as political "revenge".

It was the fourth prison sentence for Gruevski, who fled the country in 2018 for Hungary in a bid to escape the first. He was tried in absentia in the North Macedonian capital Skopje.

The nationalist strongman ruled the Balkan country with an iron fist for a decade until his downfall in 2016 following a huge wiretapping scandal. He is currently under US sanctions.

In his latest trial, the 51-year-old was accused of ordering the demolition of a residential and business complex in Skopje in 2011 in an act of political vengeance. He was sentenced for abuse of power.

Prosecutors said the complex belonged to the leader of a small party that had recently left his government.

Three other people were also handed jail sentences in the case including a former transport minister and an ex-mayor for falsely declaring the construction illegal and facilitating its demolition.

The court also ordered the defendants to pay 11 million euros in damages.

The defendants can appeal the decision.

In April, Gruevski was sentenced to seven years in prison for embezzling 1.3 million euros of his own party's funds.

In 2020 he was sentenced to one and a half years in prison in a case of incitement to violence.

The prosecutions all stem from wiretaps showing a vast system of abuse of power and corruption by the authorities, released in 2015 by the Social Democrats who at that time were in opposition.

Gruevski has been in Hungary since November 2018 and is a close friend of the country's prime minister, Viktor Orban, who granted him political asylum.

North Macedonia has unsuccessfully petitioned Budapest for his extradition. Gruevski says he fled his homeland after receiving a threat that he would be killed in jail.

He faces additional charges in North Macedonia, including in connection with a 2017 attack on parliament by nationalist protesters.