English
New mechanisms for EU membership are opening, said Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski, after his meetings with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who signed a joint proposal to simplify and speed up the EU enlargement.
The relations between the Western Balkans and the European Union are elevated to a significantly higher level. New instruments and mechanisms are opening and we will be able to actively use them in the coming period, said Mickoski who spoke to the press in Skopje today. Mickoski added that he was the only Balkan leader who met with both of the EU statesmen and that he is now in the clear about what will happen in the coming period.
Part of the plan include completing and closing some chapters and that means opening the accession talks. The answers I received from the interlocutors make me an optimist, he added.
The Prime Minister underlined that his Government will remain firmly in the position that it will not accept constitutional changes without clear and concrete guarantees from the European Union for the protection of the Macedonian national identity. Mickoski said that the new French-German proposal will allow the candidate countries to advance in the integration process without changes to the existing EU treaties that would require unanimity. At the same time, European Council President Antonio Costa said that the veto right of the member states will not necessarily apply to the opening or advancing the various chapters of integration. Bulgaria is currently blocking Macedonia from even opening the Eu accession talks, after it got the Zaev Government to accept to make changes to the Macedonian Constitution that the Mickoski Government fears will only lead to new, additional nationalist demands from Bulgaria.