German Chancellor Angela Merkel will do a tour of the Mini – Schengen/Open Balkan region near the end of her term in office, but will skip Macedonia. She will visit Belgrade and Tirana, and Zoran Zaev will travel to the latter destination for a meeting with her.

Other Balkan leaders will also travel to Tirana for the meeting. Merkel visited Macedonia only once, in the run up to the 2018 name change referendum, when Zaev welcomed other leaders such as Theresa May and James Mattis. She strongly urged Macedonians to vote in favor of the imposed name change, but the majority ignored this call and the referendum failed due to low turnout. Zaev imposed the name anyway, by arresting, blackmailing and threatening members of Parliament into voting for the change.