Foreign Minister Nikola Dimitrov, in an interview with Agency Europe, warns of the risks threatening Macedonia if the EU fails to set a date for the start of the accession negotiations in October.

If we have no perspective, and that is the stakes in October, we will weaken, and skeptics, nationalist forces and populists will be strengthened. It will help those who doubt the European project, that strategic orientation, while a positive decision will help us say things are in our hands, Dimitrov said in an interview with Agency Europe.

In case Macedonia does not get the green light this time, after fourteen years of candidate status, the minister warns that “it will not be easy for him, as a minister, to return home after October and say they will decide next year”.

He added that Macedonia fully supports Albania’s European integration, but that the country must not fall victim to the logic of putting countries into packages and reminds that the process is based on individual merit.