Former Bulgarian President Georgi Prvanov accused Macedonia of taking unfriendly positions against Bulgaria. Prvanov blamed Prime Minister Boyko Borisov for not pushing hard enough in the treaty he signed with Zoran Zaev in 2017, and said that Greece got it right by outlining all its requests in the Prespa treaty.

We see the birth of anti-Bulgarian Macedonianism in its most brutal form, Prvanov said.

According to Prvanov, it was wrong to accept the creation of a joint committee of historians without a strong mandate. Historians from the two countries are debating various issues, and the historic positions are backed with their right to veto Macedonia’s EU and NATO accession. The Macedonian side already accepted to jointly honor a number of historic figures, who are now considered part of a “shared” history, but an impasse occured over the Bulgarian request that Goce Delcev is declared a Bulgarian hero.

For me, the key is to request that the Ilinden – Preobrazenie Uprising is declared Bulgarian in its character, and that the population involved had a Bulgarian consciousness. If that is resolved favorably, it is clear that other processes going back in history had a Bulgarian character, Prvanov said.

Bulgarian nationalists insist that there is no Macedonian nation or history separate from the Bulgarian, and this is reflected in the demands raised during the talks of the historians. The word Macedonianism is used to denote the Macedonian nation as an artificial concept.

Prvanov originates from the Pirin Macedonia region, and is a historian. While President, he was lustrated after it was revealed that he was a Bulgarian secret service collaborator tasked with helping the service develop a historical narrative toward Macedonia that favors Bulgarian positions.