Basic Criminal Court of Skopje faces 420-position shortfall as backlog falls 59%

The Basic Criminal Court of Skopje reported a deep shortfall in personnel alongside measurable progress in clearing old cases at a press briefing on September 30, 2026. Court officials said the gap between sanctioned posts and filled positions amounts to 420 vacancies while the number of long-standing cases has fallen sharply.

Staffing figures, retirements and immediate shortages

According to the court, 53 judges are currently active. Eight judges are older than 59 and five have already passed the age of 64, which the court said means many will retire within the next three years. The court warned there is unlikely to be a supply of new judges because the judicial academy currently has no graduating cohorts.

Administrative and support staffing is more severely depleted. The court’s organizational chart foresees 628 positions, but only 208 are filled. For daily operations the court currently employs just 18 court police officers, two technical staff and seven cleaners.

The personnel decline has been ongoing: 13 employees retired during 2026, and between 2020 and 2025 the number of court employees fell by 131.

There is also a shortage of jurors. The court said 70 jurors are required for smooth proceedings but only 52 are active now, of whom 17 are newly elected.

Despite the staffing crisis, court management reported significant improvements in case-processing. In August 2025 there were 896 old cases; by August 2026 that number had dropped to 368. “That is a reduction of about 59% in old cases. So, despite limited resources and a small number of employees, we completed a very large amount of work,” the Basic Criminal Court said.

The court provided statistics on statute-of-limitations expirations in recent years: 16 cases in 2022, 18 in 2023, 26 in 2024 and 20 in 2025. For the first nine months of 2026 six criminal cases expired. Court officials said the rise in expirations in 2024–2025 was linked to amendments to the Criminal Code.

In the Specialized Department — a unit of high public interest — there were no expirations in 2022, nine in 2023, none in 2024, three in 2025 and none so far in 2026. The court attributed those fluctuations again to changes in the Criminal Code.

On modernization, the court said it is electronically connecting with the Agency for Real Estate Cadastre to speed up mortgage registrations. A new AI-based tool for anonymizing court decisions, developed in cooperation with Brainster, is currently in a testing phase. Because domestic law does not yet regulate AI use in the judiciary, the court announced it will formally request permission from the Judicial Council before deployment.

Photo: press material from the event