“Instead of making us more European, the EU integration process was Balkanized”

Instead of making us more European, the EU integration process was Balkanized, said Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski in his MIA interview, discussing the blockade Macedonia faces from Bulgaria, and his proposal that the demanded constitutional changes are introduced with delayed effect, to prevent provoking additional Bulgarian claims.

Everybody tells us that our proposal is fair and reasonable. The matter is that our Eastern neighbor has no stable Government, no decision-makers, and this reality complicates the process. We are constantly pointing out that our proposal is not contrary to the conclusions of the EU. How can we tell our citizens that we are amending our Constitution for this argument that there are several hundred our fellow citizens who say that they are part of the Bulgarian community, when hundreds of thousands of Macedonians in Bulgaria can’t even form a club, said Mickoski.

The Prime Minister announced that he is prepared to meet with Bulgarian representatives in 2025 and to go through all available options but that “we will not seek a solution at any price, not if it will make the process more difficult going forward”. Mickoski lamented the fact that the EU integration process is being abused by the Balkan countries that were admitted into the EU first, saying that the whole process “has been Balkanized”.