site.btaForeign Ministry Dismisses North Macedonia Prime Minister's Remarks as "Baseless Accusations"

Foreign Ministry Dismisses North Macedonia Prime Minister's Remarks as "Baseless Accusations"
Foreign Ministry Dismisses North Macedonia Prime Minister's Remarks as "Baseless Accusations"
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Sofia (BTA photo)

Reacting to Wednesday's remarks by North Macedonia Prime Minister Dimitar Kovachevski before the Council of Europe, the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry issued a statement on Thursday describing Kovachevski's criticism of Bulgaria as baseless accusations against an EU member state which is concerned about the rights of its ethnic minority in North Macedonia. The Foreign Ministry reminded Skopje of its obligation to implement the European mechanism for starting accession talks with the EU. The mechanism aims to settle a dispute between Skopje and Sofia over history, language and the rights of ethnic Bulgarians in North Macedonia.

Addressing the general debate "United for Europe" at the 4th Summit of the Council of Europe in Reykjavik, Prime Minister Kovachevski said, as quoted by MIA: "North Macedonia is internationally recognized as a successful model for functional multiethnic society and democracy. All international human rights reports confirm this fact. The accusations stated at this Summit by the representative of Bulgaria are totally ungrounded and are coming from a country that disrespects judgments of the European Court of Human Rights and the Council of Europe's standards in the area of human rights." Kovachevski also said: "The discourse widely used by Bulgaria towards North Macedonia is unfortunately very similar to the discourse of the Russian Federation towards Ukraine. It is unacceptable that false and ungrounded accusations are misused for political purposes at this crucial junction of the history of Europe." He was referring to Bulgarian Vice President Iliana Iotova who talked about systematic violation of the rights of Bulgarians in the Republic of North Macedonia and recalled a number of cases of aggression "against people because of their declared Bulgarian identity", as well as "the adoption of a special law against associations".

The full official English-language version of the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry's statement follows below:

"The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Bulgaria, with regard to the statement of the Prime Minister of North Macedonia before the Council of Europe, would like to underscore that the expression of concern for the basic rights of a community of people cannot be used as a pretext to attack an EU member state with disingenuous and baseless accusations.

"The statement of the Prime Minister of North Macedonia once again clearly demonstrates the attitude of Skopje towards the founding values of the EU and represents a rejection of the right to speak out concerning the existing deficits.

"Any analogy with the suffering of the Ukrainian people in the current unprovoked war of Russia are cynical and unacceptable.

"The European perspective of North Macedonia requires a strict implementation of the European mechanism established in July 2022. Attempts to shift public focus from the lack of will to fulfil the jointly agreed obligations are not productive and run counter to the repeatedly declared intention to build good neighbourly relations.

"Of particular concern is the implication the Prime Minister makes in his statement, that should North Macedonia not progress on the path of accession negotiations, this would negatively affect Albania. Bulgaria has been consistently supporting the European integration of all Western Balkan countries based on their own merits. Unlike North Macedonia, Albania has fully opened accession negotiations and their pace will depend solely on progress in the reform process.

"We call on the authorities in North Macedonia to demonstrate political courage and to begin implementing the commitments they have taken towards all EU member states in order to complete the opening phase of the accession negotiations. The European future of North Macedonia lies in its own hands."

/RY/

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By 13:17 on 29.03.2024 Today`s news

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