Bulgaria’s caretaker Prime Minister Svetlan Stoev said Monday the EU accession process of the Republic of Macedonia is not only a wish of the Union but Skopje needs to show actions in order to convince European partners and member-state Bulgaria they are willing to bilaterally solve existing problems that prevent Sofia from green-lighting the accession negotiations.

The Bulgarian side is working on two lines – bilateral dialogue and providing guarantees within the negotiations by EU member states that the agreements signed by Macedonia, including with Bulgaria, will be implemented in the future, Stoev said.

He added that “the short way is a bilateral way, and the long way – when you have to go through all the member states to get an agreement to include elements in the negotiating framework that satisfy Bulgaria”.

We have set very clearly what conditions must be met and when we see the fulfillment of these conditions, the environment for further dialogue will be completely different. Unfortunately, what we see, the hate speech promoted by some political forces and youth movements, does not speak in this direction.… I would like to see results during the Slovenian presidency, said Stoev.

He added that he expects Skopje to take action regarding the implementation of the clauses signed in 2017.