According to the Prime Minister of the Republic of North Macedonia Hristijan Mickoski, “it is not fair” for anyone to expect the government he leads to enter a negotiation process with the EU, in which “there is no reputation for a successful end”.
In an interview with TV Sitel, before leaving for the summit of leaders of the EU and the Western Balkan countries in Brussels, Mickoski set two conditions in order to start the procedure for changes to the country's constitution, a condition for the country's real start of negotiations with the EU.
“First, there must be clear guarantees in the form of conclusions from the European Council that no one is against the Macedonian identity, which is centuries-old constant, the Macedonian language, which tomorrow, when North Macedonia will be part of the European family, will be an official language in the EU, and that there will be no more bilateral issues, and the process will be guided by the Copenhagen criteria. This must happen. And secondly, if we are implementing things that other politicians have accepted, then the least that our eastern neighbor must implement in order for us to have any confidence in this process is what is included in the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights - to register non-governmental organizations, such as “OMO Ilinden-Pirin”, because that is what 14 judgments of the Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg say,”, stated Mickoski.
Once again, he pointed out that the citizens of North Macedonia are frustrated because they have swallowed “a lot of humiliation” on their way to the EU.
“Therefore, we are prepared to talk, to sit at the same table. There were initiatives from many influential EU member states, and also very influential politicians in Brussels, to arrange a meeting at which, at a bilateral level, there would be talks, let's say between the ministers of foreign affairs, and imagine, these initiatives were unsuccessful. There was no response from the other side. If you cannot hold such a meeting, if you cannot bring the officials from neighboring Sofia to such a meeting, what are we talking about? What guarantees are we talking about that this (the change to the constitution to include Bulgarians in it - BTA note) will be the last. Others ask me whether we have tried to talk with official Sofia at a bilateral level. Let's be clear whether this is a bilateral problem, or, as they say, a problem between Skopje, Sofia and Brussels. If the problem is bilateral, then we are right, it is about bilateralization of the process (of negotiations with the EU - BTA note), and not about criteria from Copenhagen”, said Mickoski.
The changes to the constitution of North Macedonia, to include Bulgarians in it, are a condition for holding the second intergovernmental conference and a real start of negotiations, which North Macedonia signed in 2022, but the government of Hristiyan Mickoski considers a “Bulgarian dictate”.
/ЛМ/
Source: www.bta.bg