site.btaVazrazhdane Urges North Macedonia to Observe Treaty with Bulgaria as Skopje Seeks EU Entry

The problems with protecting those who identify themselves as Bulgarians in North Macedonia are becoming more and more serious, Bulgaria’s Vazrazhdane party said in a declaration read out by its leader Kostadin Kostadinov in the National Assembly in Sofia on Wednesday.

Kostadinov said: “The accession of the Republic of North Macedonia to the European Union must be based solely on merits to the community, and a measure for that is adherence to the Good-neighbourliness Treaty with Bulgaria and the accompanying protocols as well as the conclusions of the Council of the EU of July 18, 2022.”

“However,” he said, “the Republic of North Macedonia is failing to adhere to the Good-neighbourliness Treaty and keeps conducting a campaign against Bulgaria, which is insulting, given the assistance it receives from Bulgaria, including in the aftermath of the Kocani tragedy and in the first days after our neighbour’s electricity system collapsed.”

The “Kocani tragedy” was a nightclub fire in the town of Kocani, North Macedonia on March 16, which killed 62 people and injured about 200. Bulgaria was among the countries which received people injured in the incident and provided them with medical treatment. The “collapse” of the electricity system in North Macedonia was a power outage which occurred on May 18.

Kostadinov noted that people-to-people relations across the two countries’ common border are one thing, and state-to-state relations are something else.