After the Sofia summit went by without a meaningful answer to the burning issue of the Bulgarian veto for Macedonia’s EU accession talks – with all parties avoiding the question – some insight came afterwards, from Bulgarian Defense Minister Krasimir Karakacanov. From Sofia, Karakacanov went to the city of Samokov, for the revelation of a plaque dedicated to Goce Delcev, who is in the center of the historic dispute between the two countries, and there the nationalist Defense Minister spoke on the outcome of the meeting with Zoran Zaev.

There are only a few days until the end of the process, until Friday, but they have time to correct what they missed to implement from our treaty, and we will see if that is enough to allow the opening of accession talks. The meeting with the Macedonian side was long, it started at 10h and lasted literally until 10 minutes to 17h. We spoke in a good atmosphere, there was no need for interpreters, and now it is all in their hands. The talks can end two ways, either good for Bulgaria and Macedonia, or Macedonia will have to wait to open accession talks for an indeterminate period of time, Karakacanov said.

Karakacanov added that he invited Zaev to Samokov, but he refused because he “had to rush back to Skopje to begin working on all our proposals”.