What happened: “Kumanovo is Albania” The former North Macedonian national youth team representative,
Taulant Sulejmanov, who in the meantime changed his surname to Seferi, caused a major scandal. After the
friendly match of the youth selections against Belarus on Tuesday, Seferi, who in the meantime decided to play
for Albania, posed in the dressing room wearing a T-shirt that read “Kumanovo is Albania”.
Date, time and location of the incident: 07 June, unspecified time, social media profile.
Source of information: electronic media outlet markukule.mk, offnet.mk
Victim(s) involved: none
Type of crime(s): Inciting Hatred, Discord or Intolerance on National, Racial, Religious and other Discriminatory
Grounds (Article 319, CC)
Perpetrator(s): one identified perpetrator.
Brief description of the event with bias indicators: In this incident, the bias motive is ethnicity, while the
bias indicators are:
1. Pattern of previous incidents – sports events have been used as a platform to express hate speech and incite
ethnic intolerance in previous occasions as well.
Status of the case: Unknown.
Response of the local authorities: MoI’s response to the request for information states that this incident has
not been recorded yet.
Impact on the victims and the community: This incident calls into question the ethnic co-existence of the
two major ethnic communities in the country.
