Smilkovci lake killings  The Smilkovci Lake killings (, "massacre at Smilkovci Lake") took place on 12 April 2012. Five ethnic-Macedonian civilians were shot and killed at a man-made lake near the village of Smilkovci, outside the Macedonian capital Skopje. According to the Macedonian Ministry of Internal Affairs, the attack was carried out with the intent to "incite fear and insecurity" and the ministry called it a "deliberate terrorist act aimed at destabilizing the country". The Helsinki Committee for Human Rights criticized the ministry for prematurely judging the suspects guilty. On 30 June 2014, after an 18-month trial, Alil Demiri, Afrim Ismailoviq (also known as Afrim Ismaili), Agim Ismailoviq (also known as Agim Ismaili), Fejzi Aziri, Haki Aziri and Sami Luta were sentenced to life imprisonment. Demiri and Ismailoviq were tried "in absentia", since they were imprisoned in Kosovo for unlawful possession of weapons, and extradition procedures were underway. One defendant, Rami Sejdi, was released for lack of evidence. On 1 December 2017, Macedonia's Supreme Court ordered a retrial over the 5 murders. Judges found that key facts in the men's earlier trial had been "wrongly and incompletely established" and prosecution witnesses had offered contradictory testimony. The defense has long insisted that the men have been profiled and used as scapegoats. Four of the five men killed were between 18 and 20 years of age, and the fifth was 45 years old. After the residents of the villages where the victims lived heard about the killings, angry crowds blocked the highway near the Smilkovci lake. An OSCE vehicle was attacked after an OSCE employee drove the vehicle towards an angry crowd of ethnic Macedonians. Interior Minister Gordana Jankuloska said in a press conference that "more than one perpetrator" killed five fishermen and that "by this point we [the police] are still unable to say that the killings were ethnic-related because the police have no suspects". On 15 April, the Macedonian police contacted police in neighboring countries and found a car thought to have been used by the killers near the border with Kosovo. The Interior Minister said that the police had the killers' "profile" but had not identified them. In the early hours of 1 May 2012 about 800 police officers raided 26 properties, arresting 20 people on a variety of charges.