Skopje, 19 September 2025 (MIA) - The country was ranked behind Montenegro and Albania in June in terms of the implementation of the Reform Agenda and the Growth Plan for the Western Balkans, but in December we expect to be ranked first, said Minister of European Affairs Orhan Murtezani at a meeting with journalists on Friday.

At the meeting, which was also attended by Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski, Minister Murtezani said currently Montenegro is focused on closing the opening negotiating chapters, while Albania is working on opening new chapters, which is a significant opportunity for North Macedonia to focus on the Growth Plan and why he said he expects the country to be ranked first in the December report.

“We decided that all laws in the Reform Agenda, once adopted by the Government, should be sent to the European Commission for an assessment, and then move to Parliament. This could mean a certain delay in their adoption, but we will be sure that everything is in order,” Murtezani said.

The Minister said most remarks by the European Commission are over the Criminal Code adopted by the previous government. 

PM Mickoski said the country would not accept all of the EC’s requests in terms of legislation, especially not the request for the liberalization of the price of electricity for households, noting that “this would mean an increase in the price by two to three times, especially in the first three years of liberalization”.

“We also won’t accept the request to increase funds for judges and prosecutors, which requires that we allocate 1.3 percent of GDP annually, or twice as much as we do now. That would mean USD 100 million annually, and in a few years USD 250 million. Personally, I think they don’t even deserve their current wages, since they have an approval rating of only 2 percent. Based on their [the EC’s] request, the wages of judges and prosecutors would move between Mden 300.000 and 350.000. That’s why we asked the Ministry of Finance to conduct a comparative analysis of how much is allocated for the judiciary in Germany, Croatia, Hungary,... and then present this to the EC,” Mickoski said, adding that initial results show that Germany is allocating much less of its budget for the judiciary than what is being required of North Macedonia.

MIA file photo