The Albanian coalition partner of the Macedonian Prime Minister Christian Mickoski has renounced his demand that the Bulgarians be included in the Constitution of Northern Macedonia within 6 months, BGNES reports.
VLEN set this very condition in order to form a government with VMRO-DPMNE after the parliamentary elections in May. VLEN leader Arben Taravari (current health minister) made this promise throughout his election campaign.
Moreover, the Albanian bloc is now defending Mickoski's thesis of renegotiating the conditions for starting negotiations with the European Union/EU. However, such a possibility was categorically rejected by a number of European diplomats. The EU ambassador in Skopje, David Geer, said that Mickoski would not get a better offer.
The VLEN Coalition justifies its change of position by the lack of a regular government in Bulgaria.
VLEN spokesman Fari Hyseni pointed out that "the political instability in Bulgaria is the reason why his party will not ask for Bulgarians to be included in the constitution within six months."
"We are in constant communication and coordination with international actors. These are broader issues, which means that an opportunity may open up because we have an ad hoc situation with neighboring Bulgaria. If there was a working government in Bulgaria, I think negotiations would have already started to reach an agreement between North Macedonia and Bulgaria," Hyseni said.
According to him, "given the situation in the Republic of Bulgaria, there is a possibility, coordinated with international factors, to extend the deadline for constitutional changes."
"At the moment we have a situation in another country that is not stable in terms of the executive. So, we can't blame something else when the second party in the whole process doesn't have a stable government or doesn't have a person to negotiate on this particular topic. It does not depend on North Macedonia, but on the policies in neighboring Bulgaria," Hyseni added.
The VLEN did not specify whether they agree with the idea of coalition partner VMRO-DPMNE for constitutional changes "with delayed entry into force".
The former ruling Social Democratic Union (SDSM) party insists that the VLEN fulfils the promises it made to open the constitution and include Bulgarians in it.
Prime Minister Christian Mickoski has repeatedly stressed that "there are no conditions for starting talks with the current Bulgarian government" to continue the process of European integration of Skopje. He announced that in the country "only a few hundred citizens define themselves as Bulgarians" and "Macedonians will discard their Bulgarian passports as soon as they enter the EU".
Manuel Saracin, the special representative of the Federal Republic of Germany for the Western Balkans, noted two weeks ago that Skopje was not living up to the hopes of including the Bulgarian population in North Macedonia in the constitution.
"(North Macedonia Prime Minister) Mickoski stressed how important North Macedonia's Euro-Atlantic orientation is for him - its path towards the European Union and NATO membership. And I believe him. It is too early to say whether he and his government are really ready to go down this path. We have to judge by the deeds of this government", the German diplomat underlined. | BGNES
