Skopje, 6 February 2025 (MIA) – Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski expects that meetings with officials of the Bulgarian government to take place in the coming period. According to him, this is not something that should surprise us because, as he said, it is normal for us to talk with our neighbours and build relationships.

“As for meetings, we have already held talks with the high Bulgarian officials in the past, including their then caretaker prime minister. I expect that in the near future, there will be meetings at various levels with the Bulgarian government, and this is not something that should take us by surprise. Neither we nor they are going anywhere, we will still be neighbours,” Mickoski in response to a question from MIA about possible meetings with the new Bulgarian leadership, after the Minister for European Affairs, Orhan Murtezani, stated in Brussels on Wednesday that the Bulgarian side is ready for talks.

Mickoski underscored that we must build good neighbourly relations, but this does not mean we agree on issues that divide us.

“That’s why I am always an advocate for discussing topics that bring us closer. Our position is clear and unchanged, and I am confident that it will not change because I personally believe, and the representatives in the government believe, that as a people and as a country, we have done more in the past two and a half decades for European integration that anyone else has, and I believe that finally, after two and a half decades, or two decades since we became EU candidate country, we should not have any more bilateral conditions, but we should have objective conditions in the negotiation process. And this is not different from what I have said before. I will say this in meetings from Washington, through Brussels, London, Rome, Paris... because I believe in this, because we have done enough, and like no one else has, in the name of that European future, this country has done,” Mickoski said.

PM Mickoski reiterated that Macedonia has made so many concessions that it deserves at least to start the process.

“After two decades of challenges, we have earned the right to at least begin the process. I will never talk about a process where we only discuss its beginning, but not its end. If I have such a counterpart, they are welcome to come forward, but otherwise, we will continue solving our own problems and working on our domestic tasks,” Mickoski stated.

Bulgaria’s representative in the Working Party on Enlargement and Countries Negotiating Accession to the EU conveyed that the Bulgarian side is ready for talks and sent positive signals regarding the establishment of dialogue, Minister of European Affairs Orhan Murtezani, who is on a two-day visit to Brussels, told MIA.

“I think a good environment is being created, which we must use not only to establish dialogue that must exist between neighboring countries but also to create room that will lead us to a mutually acceptable solution and finally get us into the EU,” Murtezani said.

Photo: MIA archive