go to the original language article
Washington – Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski believes that as a nation we have suffered too many humiliations and have accepted bad agreements in the name of higher goals for Euro-Atlantic integration, and the country is still not even at the beginning of the path to EU membership. Now, he says, we are once again being asked for constitutional changes, but that still does not guarantee certainty on the Euro-integrative path.
– As a nation, we did everything we could, we suffered many humiliations and accepted many bad agreements for our European perspective and for NATO membership, Mickoski said in a speech at an Atlantic Council event in Washington dedicated to the future of transatlantic relations in the Western Balkans.
The frustrations among the citizens of my country, Mickoski adds, are extremely high.
– I testify that when we were in opposition in 2018, many people from around the world, high officials from the EU, prime ministers from many powerful NATO countries, presidents, members of the European Commission, visited us and said just change the name this time and you will immediately become members of NATO, you will start negotiations with the EU and finish them in a period of 4 to 5 years and become part of the EU. Those 4-5 years passed 2 years ago and we are in the same situation as 20 years ago, but in the meantime, we changed the flag, currency, name, and everything, Mickoski pointed out.
Before us, according to him, there is now a new demand for a constitutional change, which does not guarantee certainty on the Euro-integrative path. – Tell me another case in Europe, which is at least remotely similar to ours, I’m not speaking about approximately similar. This time we said, if Pacta sunt servanda applies to us, then let it apply to everyone. If we deliver, then we expect others to deliver as well, Mickoski said.
– We now have to include several hundred of our compatriots in the constitutional preamble, which is a description of our Constitution. We are talking about the Bulgarian community. In our constitution, we have Macedonians, Albanians, Serbs, Turks, Bosniaks, Aromanians, etc., so if you analyze things from that perspective, it’s not a big deal. But why include them in the preamble? Maybe we are talking about human rights, maybe someone is violating the human rights of the Bulgarian community? Who are we as politicians to judge whether someone’s human rights are violated? There is an institution in Europe called the Human Rights Court in Strasbourg responsible for judging whether someone’s human rights are violated or not. And what does that institution say in recent years? They were clear, 14 times human rights of the Macedonian community in Bulgaria were violated, and zero times of the Bulgarian community in Macedonia. Fourteen to zero. How to explain this to the citizens, why we are doing this when we get nothing in return, Mickoski pointed out.
According to him, this request is not substantial because negotiations mean strengthening institutions, improving the capacities of institutions, not resolving bilateral issues. – We said we will implement this, but after we finish our negotiations because we fear this might turn into an endless story and new and new demands will follow and no one knows when it will end, said Mickoski, adding that when talking about the European future it should be about common values, about artificial intelligence, about a good living environment, about the economy, about better education, not about something that happened in the medieval times. (February 21)