The General Affairs Council (GAC) scheduled for tomorrow, December 8, will be held via video conferencing, said VMRO-DPMNE MP Antonio Milososki, citing diplomatic sources in Brussels. Milososki clarified that such online sessions of GAC are considered informal and cannot make final decisions or conclusions.

Therefore, the General Affairs Council tomorrow will give draft conclusions on enlargement, as well as draft conclusions on Macedonia and Albania in a package. These draft conclusions will be subject to adoption by the member states through the so-called “written procedure”, which lasts one day, ie they should be confirmed on 9 December. At tomorrow’s informal General Affairs Council, there will be no discussion on a draft negotiating framework neither for Macedonia nor for Albania, due to the lack of consensus among the member states‼‼ Also, in the draft conclusions of the Council there will be no date for the start of negotiations with Macedonia and Albania, nor a date for when the first intergovernmental conference would be held. There will only be a recommendation that the intergovernmental conference should be held as soon as possible, after the negotiating framework is adopted by consensus in the EU Council, Milososki said.

Additionally, Milososki explains, there will be a position where the Council points out that good neighborly relations remain an essential element in the enlargement process, as well as a note on the importance of Macedonia delivering visible results through concrete implementation of bilateral agreements with Bulgaria and Greece.

From 2018 until the end of 2020, this will be the fourth veto for Macedonia, ie in diplomatic terms there is no consensus on a date for the start of accession negotiations with the EU, says Milososki.