High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell shattered hopes that Macedonia could start negotiations with the EU without accepting Bulgarian demands. He told our country that the road to negotiations leads through Sofia as it did a few years ago through Athens.

Although Borrell is well aware that Macedonia and Bulgaria are not equal in the negotiations and that Sofia has the support of Brussels, he called for an agreement with Bulgaria, although he knows well the positions of the Bulgarian authorities.

An agreement with Bulgaria is almost impossible unless their demands that the Macedonian language is a Bulgarian dialect are accepted and that the Macedonians were Bulgarians until 1944. Of course, the most important issue for them is that Goce Delcev is a Bulgarian.

Borrell had a short answer to all this.

I cannot promise you a date but I can promise you a will.

The EU date has turned into a will.

This is a step backwards in Macedonia’s European integration since 2005. The last representatives at least promised a date for negotiations, of course as soon as the country resolved the dispute with Greece.

Borrell’s predecessor Federica Mogherini and the well-known Johannes Hahn also came to Skopje with such a message.

A date for the start of negotiations for the country this summer, and opening of the negotiation chapters by the end of the year, said Hahn in 2019.

Hahn’s predecessors were no better, but at least they mentioned the key word “date”.