Bulgarian member of the European Parliament Andrey Kovatchev confirmed that Bulgaria will request full and strict application of the 2017 Zaev – Borisov treaty before allowing Macedonia to advance its EU accession talks.
Bulgaria appended a statement to the recent decision of the European Council to allow Macedonia to open accession talks – without finally setting a date when this could be expected to happen. The lengthy statement demands that the Macedonian language is referred to as the “official language of the Republic of North Macedonia” in all EU institutions, that the commission on creating a joint historical narrative resumes its work and that Macedonia renounces the existence of a Macedonian minority in Bulgaria.
You were given a date because Bulgaria supported it. You wouldn’t have gotten a date if Bulgaria was opposed. The Bulgarian position is clear, the conditions that must be met are clearly outlined for Bulgaria to continue to support Macedonia in all the stages of the accession process. Ultimately, the decision to join the EU will be made unanimously, and all member states will have a key say, Kovatchev told the MKD.mk news site, which published the Bulgarian statement.
Bulgaria considers the Macedonian language as a Bulgarian dialect and insists that the Macedonian nation is a newly founded concept while most of the history should be seen as shared, and that most Macedonian historic figures since the medieval times were Bulgarians. Zaev and his Foreign Minister Nikola Dimitrov insisted that the “friendship treaty” they signed with Bulgaria in 2017 guarantees the uniqueness of the Macedonian nation, but have since been asked to make concession after concession. Currently the joint commission on the history is not working – after hitting a road block over the Bulgarian demand that Macedonia accepts the Bulgarian character of Goce Delcev the Macedonian historians cited the coming elections as a reason to stop their meetings, which Bulgaria considers a violation of the treaty.
We can’t debate over who were Goce Delcev, Dame Gruev, Hristo Tatarcev. Your modern Macedonian identity rests on the Bulgarian national history, Kovatchev piled on. He announced that, even if the accession talks begin, Bulgaria will be able to block the opening and closing of every of the 35 negotiating chapters and that “it is no coincidence that this statement is added to the conclusions of the European Council”.
Dimitrov insisted that the fact Bulgaria did not veto the European Council conclusion means that it will not obstruct Macedonia’s path. He also strongly condemned the Bulgarian position on the language as a violation of the European values.
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