Yesterday, the leader of the VMRO-DPMNE Nikola Gruevski held separate meetings with US Ambassador Jess Baily, EU Ambassador Samuel Žbogar and the Ambassador of Norway, Arne Sannes Bjørnstad, where they discussed the results of the early parliamentary elections, the expectations of the new parliament and government, the work of the State Election Commission as well as the hate speech from the protests outside the SEC.
At the meeting with Ambassador Baily, where party officials Nikola Todorov, Vladimir Gjorcev and Aleksandar Nikolovski were also present, expressed interest in some questions, but received no reply.
When asked about plans for further coalition of the VMRO-DPMNE, the party announced that coalitions will depend not only on VMRO-DPMNE, but on other political parties as well, even though the decision should be made within the parties, some are influenced by other external factors.
“On the issue of Ambassador Baily and external factors, at present we do not have authorization to inform you on the matter. When asked whether Ambassador Baily in this respect could do something to help the country, we were told that he could not help, primarily because his role as Ambassador is to monitor the situation in the country and to inform his country of developments. As for the Ambassador’s remark that so far he had helped, the party expressed gratitude for this help”, reads the statement from the VMRO-DPME.
During the meeting, it was stated that the Ambassador had said that it would be good that the people protesting to calm down and asked, what the reaction of the VMRO-DPMNE would be to the SEC’s decisions. To this question Baily received no reply, on the grounds that the party at the moment is not able to respond to such a question, nor, would they respond to the hypothetical question on whether they would respect the decisions of the SEC.
The US Ambassador stressed that the US are friends of Macedonia, although some members of the party did not share his view in his opinion. In return the party said that VMRO-DPMNE had no dilemma about NATO, the EU and relations with the United States, and the best proof of that is the signed declaration on strategic partnership, but that does not mean that an individual, party or state can not express discord by some steps made by individuals who represent US.
At the meeting with EU Ambassador Samuel Žbogar, they discussed the assessments of the elections, the SEC, as well as messages and expectations from Brussels of the new parliament and the new government.
Žbogar stressed that Brussels had also expressed concern about the rhetoric used by some of the speakers at the demonstration outside the SEC. VMRO-DPMNE, in their statement, said that they support peaceful demonstrations and that they do not support hate speech, but they also added that they regret that Brussels and the international community did not express such concern in the past two years as they watched the demonstrations. In terms of the ongoing protests, the party said they “can not predict what will happen because there are a number of revolted citizens whose actions can not be predicted and controlled if the institutions do not work in accordance with the law”.
The meeting with Norwegian Ambassador Arne Sannes Bjørnstad, Gruevski and representatives of the party said that in the last two years in the country, serious interference had occurred by certain representatives of the international community in the internal affairs of the country, as well as internal political and inter-party working. Such a practice, the party stated, was present during the campaign and during the election period, and should stop.
