site.btaUPDATED PM Zhelyazkov: "My Collegue Mickoski Should Find Way to Offer Apology"

Bulgarian Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov suggested here Friday that the government leader of the Republic of North Macedonia, Hristijan Mickoski, should find a way to apologize for using disrespectful in reference to Bulgarian Foreign Minister Georgi Georgiev. "The colleague Mickoski should find a way to offer his apology because when a government leader uses such insults to members of a foreign government, it harms good-neighbourly relations and trust that is very fragile these days," Zhelyazkov said as he spoke to reporters in Rome where he is attending a high-level Ukraine Recovery Conference.

He reiterated that Bulgaria will continue to support Skopje on its European path: "without wavering, based on the implementation of commitments of 2022 and the good-neighbourly treaty".  

He said he "would leave to the Aesop scholars the rhetoric of Prime Minister Mickoski" and said once again that Bulgaria's principled position is that Skopje must stick to the concensus of 2022 and deliver on the commitments it has made. "There are many in Bulgaria who disapprove of the 2022 commitments as well, but political maturity requires that commitments be met," he added. 

In a statement on Thursday, Prime Minister Mickoski said that Bulgarian Foreign Minister Georg Georgiev should be ignored because he is “carrying out a task”. “That guy was sent to get my attention. I think we shouldn't give him the opportunity," he said as quoted by the MIA news agency. "It’s like when a mouse teases a lion," he added.

Mickoski was inflamed by Foreign Minister Georgiev referring to him as the “North Macedonian prime minister.” The Foreign Ministry in Skopje stated that it had summoned the Bulgarian Ambassador to North Macedonia Zhelyazko Radukov, to whom an official protest was delivered. The ambassador was also informed of “the inappropriateness of such public statements made by a high-ranking official of the Bulgarian government.”

In turn, the Foreign Ministry is Sofia put out a statement saying that it "strongly condemns the unacceptable and offensive language" used by Prime Minister Mickoski in reference to a Bulgarian government member. "Such statements are incompatible with the basic norms of diplomatic and political dialogue, as well as with the principles of good neighbourly relations that the Republic of North Macedonia publicly claims to uphold, yet in practice continues to violate."