Demonstrations in Skopje against the proposed EU agreement to settle the disputes between North Macedonia and Bulgaria continued last night for the ninth day.
Several thousand protesters, mostly supporters of the largest opposition party, VMRO-DPMNE, gathered last night in front of the government building in Skopje and headed towards the Parliament. The demonstration proceeded peacefully, without incident. A similar demonstration will take place this evening as well.
The protesters are calling on the North Macedonian government to reject this EU proposal, arguing that it serves Bulgarian interests and endangers North Macedonia’s language, national identity and history.
Sofia has accepted the European proposal, which was ratified by its parliament.
The government of Dimitar Kovacevski in Skopje, which by all indications is in favor of the proposal, has sent the proposal to Parliament for consideration and a vote and has indicated that it will act on Parliament’s decision.
The meeting of the Parliament on this matter is expected in the next few days and according to all indications, the proposal will be approved, as a simple majority is sufficient for such a thing. According to Skopje media reports, the proposal will be supported by around 70 MPs from the Social Democratic Party (SDSM) of Dimitar Kovačevski and from all Albanian parties. The whole of the Parliament has 120 seats.
Meanwhile, the Central Committee of the Social Democratic Party (SDSM) came out last night in favor of the European proposal.
The leader of the largest opposition party, VMRO-DPMNE, which is leading the protests against the EU proposal, Christian Mickoski called on SDSM MPs to “listen to the voice of the people” and oppose the proposal.
In the event that the country’s government accepts the proposal, then an EU-North Macedonia intergovernmental conference is expected to be set next week, in which it will be decided that North Macedonia, like Albania, will start accession negotiations with the EU. However, based on the proposal, the first chapters of North Macedonia’s negotiations with the EU will open after the country first amends its Constitution, with the inclusion of the Bulgarian minority living in the country. The amendment of the Constitution requires a 2/3 majority in the Parliament, which the government in Skopje and the parties supporting the proposal do not currently have.
It is recalled that for a year and a half Bulgaria has been preventing the start of North Macedonia’s accession negotiations with the EU due to open ethnic, linguistic and historical differences between the two countries, which has provoked strong reactions from Skopje and led to the cooling of their relations .
SOURCE: AMPE
Source: Capital
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