SkopjeDiem Macedonia in English

In a phone call with French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo urged expressed support for Macedonia’s NATO and EU road. “Secretary Pompeo urged French Foreign Minister Le Drian to support NATO extending an invitation to Macedonia to join, as well as the EU opening accession talks, following the signing of the name agreement between ...

In a letter sent to her NATO counterparts, Defence Minister Radmila Sekerinska asks them for support for a membership invitation for Macedonia at the July Summit. As the Defence Ministry said in Sunday’s press-release, Sekerinska also had phone conversations with some of them. “I’m writing to you following the reaching of the historic agreement with Greece over the name. This ...

British PM Theresa May has sent a letter to her Macedonian counterpart, Zoran Zaev, congratulating him on both the name deal and the parliamentary ratification. She assesses that the deal wouldn’t have been possible had there been no political courage, vision and leadership. According to May, the solution will result in huge benefits for the two countries. The British PM ...

VMRO-DPMNE reiterated on Thursday its stand on the name deal reached between Skopje and Athens. “The deal is omitting the Macedonian identity from the anthem, the textbooks, the tradition and culture. Though documents prove that the nationality and language were recognised in the UN, the deal has seen PM Zoran Zaev give up on that right,” party spokesperson Naum Stoilkovski ...

Will the high threshold for the name referendum to be successful be reduced? On Wednesday, FM Nikola Dimitrov announced that option, too, in an interview with the Top topic show, in the event of a VMRO-DPMNE boycot. He also said that the exact number of voters in Macedonia wasn’t known. “There are 1.8 million voters that are part of the ...

“Macedonia is not a final destination for migrants but it advanced the asylum law,” Interior Minister Oliver Spasovski said on Thursday. In his view, Macedonia’s regulation is in accordance with all international legal standards. “It’s about a quality legal framework, founded on respect for the existing domestic regulation, but also on our obligations arising from the declared pledge for full ...

“Refugee camps will not be built in Macedonia,” Minister of Transport and Communications Goran Sugareski said during Thursday’s visit to Stip. According to him, the topic was highly misused during the local elections. “I have no information that someone is planning on building such camps in Macedonia. I will once again say that we mustn’t instill some psychosis or panic ...

On Wednesday and Thursday, in Stip, seven mayors and their delegations from Bulgaria, Poland, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Romania and Macedonia debated the EU’s benefits. “To us, it’s a big experience that we exchanged views and experiences with a country that is still not part of the European Union,” Maria Des Meira from Portugal pointed out. The Municipality of Stip representatives, ...

On Wednesday, Parliament adopted the law for ratification of the Skopje-Athens name agreement. 69 parliamentarians voted in favour. VMRO-DPMNE, whose MPs didn’t participate in the session, said it would request interpretation from the Venice Commission to determine the legal nature of the deal. “The deal marks a beginning of the end of the uncertainty for Macedonia and represents a dignified ...

NATO Sec Gen Jens Stoltenberg hopes a membership invitation will be able to be sent to Macedonia at the Summit in Brussels on 11 and 12 July, following the Skopje-Athens name agreement. “Hopefully, we can make progress especially when it comes to the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia because they have now reached an agreement with Greece on the name ...