Macedonia is ready to work further on certain issues in the Good Neighborly Agreement with Bulgaria, and for that purpose, working groups from the Macedonian and Bulgarian foreign ministries will be discussing on a daily basis, in order to overcome the differences on the expectations from the Agreement. This was stressed, among other issues, by the Foreign Affairs Minister Bujar Osmani during today’s press conference. He says that this was agreed in Sofia, during the meeting with his Bulgarian counterpart Ekaterina Zaharieva.
“We held talks in Sofia about all the issues and the Agreement, and we concluded that there are differences in the expectations. That is why we agreed that both ministries of foreign affairs will form working groups that will be discuss on a daily basis the different interpretations and dilemmas. I think we have no problem to make additional explanations to the Bulgarian counterparts that the new name is in use, both the long and the short forms, but both the short form (North Macedonia) and the long, represent the same territory, and that is the Republic of North Macedonia. If the shortened name is causing concern in the Republic of Bulgaria, that someone might interpret it as a territorial pretension towards the historical region of Macedonia, I think we have no problem to make an additional clarification for the Bulgarian side,” said Osmani.
Regarding the last requests made by the Bulgarian politicians for correctiont to the plaques on the monuments where it is written “Bulgarian fascist conqueror,” Osmani said that this is a question for the commissions and not for the politicians to discuss.
“It’s good that there is a mutual downplay of the tone on the historical issues but the commissions are those that supposed to find a solution and not the politicians, because else, it will always be disputed in the future,” stressed Osmani, who also said that he is encouraging both countries’ commission to quickly arrive to certain decisions that will provide a new dynamic in both countries’, with a glimpse towards the future and not the past.