English
In a lengthy interview with Breitbart, Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski discussed Macedonia’s strong alignment with the US leadership in the world, and the close communication with the Trump administration that began even before the 2024 US elections.
Practically, we are fully aligned with all resolutions in United Nations, and we supported them in the past two years a lot of times when it comes to the Iran issue, Venezuela, Cuba issue, and so on and so forth. Also, we are in a very strong communication with Ambassador Ric Grenell. We are discussing about the future potential cooperation in energy with the Ambassador of the United States in Greece, Ms Guilfoyle. We are talking about American LNG trade potential in the region. We are trying to promote economical interest in the region, and we strongly do that. We are the pivotal point of American interests in the Balkans, and we are a strong pillar of support of American interests in the Balkans. So, practically, without any doubt, we stand next to our strategical partners, the United States’s and President Trump’s policy, and we strongly support them, the Prime Minister said, adding that Macedonia opened its airport facilities for the US Air Force in the war against Iran.
Mickoski, who is due to visit the United States in September, said that this will e a good opportunity to conclude the bilateral trade deal between the two countries that is being negotiated. “With this bilateral treaty, we will make our bilateral partnerships much more stronger and much more feasible in terms of economical cooperation in the future, and this will open the gates for U.S. exports and investors to have a much more ambitious and much more meaningful role not only in the Balkans but also in Europe generally speaking”, the Prime Minister added.
In the interview, Mickoski also discussed the long delayed EU integration process of Macedonia, which he said is becoming ever more important with the strategic challenges and competition in the region.
We are now in a very, I would say, critical situation, and very funny situation. In one multilateral organization, we are allies with Bulgaria, with our eastern neighbor. I’m talking about NATO. And in another multilateral organization, European Union, we have the same allies from NATO imposing constraints for us and imposing a veto, which is not a very, I would say, friendly gesture. Those are the double standards and unanimity rule within the EU itself. They can’t understand that our membership in the EU is strategical for NATO. As I said, from plenty of reasons, among them is resilience and security. So they are weakening the south and eastern flank of NATO by constraining us to become a part of the EU, because as economically much more stronger is my country that makes much more resilient the eastern flank of NATO—and we will be able to modernize in a much quicker way our armed forces and invest more into the corridors which are important for logistical purposes of NATO. So there are plenty of reasons why we need to be a part of the EU, and this is the reason plus for the United States and President Trump’s administration to support us in this manner, Mickoski said.
The Prime Minister also presented Macedonia as a strong candidate for development of data infrastructure, with the upcoming hydro energy projects that could satisfy the needs of the industry.
Bearing in mind climate changes and global heating, I think that the region will need the additional two reservoir supporters. My country has a wonderful perspective, and this is a magnificent, amazing environment for developing those kind of hydropower plants with the high dams, with a big installed capacity, and this is the only reason why we would like to develop those two hydropower plants first to secure our water supply for the region, and second for the irrigation, and then as a third priority producing electricity—although we are talking about one terawatt hour electricity annually, which is a super big amount of electricity for the size of a country like ours. This is a super big amount of electricity, Mickoski said, noting the talks with potential investors such as Macedonian – Canadian businessman Chris Pavlovski from Rumble.