1st October 2024, Skopje – Deputy Minister of Finance, Nikolche Jankulovski, Ph.D., held a coordination meeting with Director of the Property and Legal Affairs Office, Zoran Krstanoski and Director of the Financial Intelligence Office, Kujtim Ibishi, focused on both amendments to the Law on Expropriation and the Law on the Prevention of Money Laundering and Financing Terrorism.
It concerns two legal solutions, which implementation is within the scope of both institutions under the Ministry of Finance’s competence.
Draft Law on Modifications and Amendments to the Law on Prevention of Money Laundering and Financing Terrorism addresses certain inadequacies as regards the legal provisions determined under the Fifth Round Mutual Evaluation Report on Anti-Money Laundering and Financing Terrorism of the Republic of North Macedonia by the MONEYVAL Committee within the Council of Europe, adopted in May 2023, Deputy Minister of Finance said. He added that the additional reason behind the adoption of the proposed amendments and modifications, is the fact that solutions have been integrated therein, with the aim of complete harmonization with the EU legislation relevant for prevention of money laundering and financing terrorism.
More to the point, approximation with:
– Directive 2015/849 on the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purpose of money laundering or terrorist financing,
– Directive 2018/843 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30th May 2018 amending Directive (EU) Directive 2015/849 on the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purposes of money laundering or terrorist financing, and
– Regulation 2023/1113 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 31st may 2023 on information accompanying transfers of funds and certain crypto-assets, implying improvement of the prescribed European Standards, among else necessary for North Macedonia’s process in the Single Euro Payment Area Platform (SEPA).
Pertaining to the amendments to the Law on Expropriation, as the Deputy Minister underscored, the Law on Construction is being harmonized with respect to first and second category energy constructions, such as constructions of public interest, as well as terminology approximation with the Law on Expertise, according to which, the Bureau for Appraisal in lieu of Bureau for Court Expertise will be the institution performing appraisals throughout the expropriation procedure.
A further delineation of the legal provisions referring to other limitations as regards the ownership rights has been in the make, which allows for the possibility of extending the deadline by two more years pertaining to temporary hold of neighbouring land. This has come about due to construction of facilities and infrastructure of strategic interest for the country, for which a longer construction period is necessary. Existing 2-year time frame is insufficient, thus, this deadline will be extended by another two years on the basis on an elaborated proposal by the expropriation proposer.
The novelty in this Law is anticipating the possibility of assigning a temporary representative, proposed by the Bar Association, as advocate of rights and interests of individuals’ claim to inheritance in the event when the owner of the property being expropriated is deceased, i.e. a person with unknown permanent or temporary place of residence. This would allow for smooth effectuation of the public interest, while also providing appropriate protection of interests of the owners of the property – subject to the proceedings.
The proposed Law integrates further specification and amendment to the provisions pertaining to the procedure for revocation of binding effective decisions for expropriation and termination of agreements reached during the proceedings, when the expropriated property will not produce public interest due to the urban plan or project documentation changes, i.e. expired legal deadline for construction.
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