Skopje, 7 May 2025 (MIA) - Not just us, but the entire Western Balkans is poses no issue at all for the European Union’s absorption capacity, and if anyone wants to they can find a solution, President Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova said Wednesday in an interview for national broadcaster MRT.

Regarding the statement by the European Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos that “North Macedonia is a sad story”, the President said she doesn’t believe the Commissioner made the statement cynically, and stressed it is the story of European democracy that is sad.

“If we have 17 reports in which the European Parliament and the European Commission recommend the beginning of negotiations while the Council says no, and then suddenly says we are backing this if the Constitution is amended, then this says a lot about the credibility and integrity, not about what you refer to as a ‘sad story’. It is the story of European democracy that is sad from this aspect because if there is no balance between the Parliament, the Commission and the Council, while the Council has the final word, then we are talking about a democratic deficit,” Siljanovska-Davkova said.

Asked whether the country is not “persuasive” enough when it comes to the idea of constitutional amendments with deferred effect or if the EU is principled in its demands for the country to implement what it has accepted, Siljanovska-Davkova said there is a little bit of everything, stressing that “if constitutional amendments were a factor of Europeanization, then we would have been chairing the EU today, but this is not the case”.

“Based on my meetings with presidents, ambassadors and so on, I get the impression that when you explain the issue and what is being demanded from us, most of them don’t feel very comfortable, but they say, look, this is what you accepted. It isn’t nice to say what someone has done or said, but, it isn’t pleasant to hear that some of these people have, with the best intentions, told those who made the decisions to think well before accepting the French proposal,” President Siljanovska-Davkova said.

On whether the country now feels “prouder” than before, the President said a year cannot make a huge difference, but “according to the polls, it seems as if the people now feel respected, even though we have existing issues”.

Photo: MIA Archive