A protest note due to repeated cases of desecration of Bulgarian national symbols was delivered to the Ambassador of the Republic of North Macedonia to Bulgaria, Agneza Rusi Popovska, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) announced.
At a meeting between Popovska and Yordan Parvanov, Director General for European Affairs, serious concern and concern were expressed over repeated cases of desecration of Bulgarian national symbols on the territory of the neighboring country.
On May 4, 2025, hours after the laying of wreaths at the grave of Gotse Delchev in the church of “St. Spas“, it was found that among the many wreaths laid, only the tricolor ribbon with the Bulgarian flag had been removed.
In addition, another act of vandalism was committed against the moraine donated by Bulgaria, which is located in the Francophonie Park in Skopje, the press release states.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Bulgaria categorically condemns such hostile actions. It regrets to note that identical unacceptable encroachments have been registered in previous periods.
The latter is indicative of the fact that the systematic lack of reaction by the competent authorities in the Republic of North Macedonia further fuels the transformation of manifestations of hostility and vandalism on an anti-Bulgarian basis into a sustainable trend.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Bulgaria expects the authorities of the neighboring country to take the necessary actions to identify the perpetrators of these acts and hold them accountable, as well as for the timely restoration of the moraine monument in its authentic form.
In August 2024, Agneza Rusi Popovska was also summoned to the Foreign Ministry to express a strong protest after the press conference of Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Transport Aleksandar Nikoloski on August 29 this year. Nikoloski announced that the process of constitutional changes in the country and the negotiating framework are the main topic in the Bulgarian media every time there are elections in Bulgaria. He said this after being asked to comment on a statement by the Bulgarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which stated that “the authorities in Skopje should be clear that attempts to launch ideas for renegotiation can only lead to a new distance from the start of the negotiations“.
The statement by the Bulgarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs also came in response to the words of the Prime Minister of North Macedonia Hristijan Mickoski that the country wants to unblock the European integration process and will work committedly on this agenda, but on the other hand it needs to have a partner with whom it can communicate, stressing that it hopes to have a regular government after the Bulgarian parliamentary elections on October 27, with which to find a solution to the decade-long blockade of North Macedonia's European integration.