"North Macedonia” could be back in mix

7 July 2009 | 10:31 | Source: B92

SKOPLJE -- The UN mediator in the Macedonian “name” dispute has yet to make a new proposal, and instead, the option “North Macedonia” seems to be back in the frame.

Mathew Nimetz arrived in Skopje today with an already known and final package of ideas that were put on the negotiating table in October of last year.

The old-new proposal would be the Republic of North Macedonia.

Although still unofficial, it seems that the fears of the Macedonian public that these negotiations are not only about the name of the country, but language and identity too, could be realized.

The proposal calls for the adjective for the nationality to be Macedonian, or the alternative “nationality of the Republic of North Macedonia,” and the language to be Macedonian or the alternative: “the official language of the Republic of North Macedonia.”

The suggestion to place identity in the focus of the talks was directly introduced on Monday by U.S. State Department senior official Philip Gordon, who said that this was a package that could not be divided.

After a very long meeting with Macedonian Foreign Minister Antonio Miloshoski, Nimetz was playing his cards close to his chest.

“I had a long and constructive talk with Minister Miloshoski, you will find out all the details at the official press conference,” the UN mediator said.

Nimetz will have two separate meetings today, one with Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski and one with President Gjorgje Ivanov, before traveling to Athens to meet with Greek Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyannis.

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Light in tunnel for name talks

Thursday July 9, 2009

The United Nations mediator in the name dispute between Greece and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) yesterday indicated that there was scope for a settlement to the longstanding wrangle following talks with government officials in Athens.

“We’re closer now than we were in the past. I’m more optimistic than I was some time back,” Matthew Nimetz said following one-and-a-half hours of talks with Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyannis.

Nimetz presented Bakoyannis with a tweaked version of a proposal made last October for a new name for FYROM, the Republic of Northern Macedonia. Foreign Ministry officials gave no reaction yesterday to the amended proposal. But Nimetz was upbeat. “I do think that there is desire in both countries to reach a solution,” he told reporters. Sources, meanwhile, told Kathimerini that officials in FYROM appear ready to accept a composite name solution.

The envoy added that issues of language and identity were “peripheral” to current negotiations about the name.

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“Essential Progress” In Macedonia Name Spat

Skopje | 24 August 2009 | Sinisa-Jakov Marusic

Essential progress has been achieved in the Athens-Skopje UN talks over Macedonia’s official name, but a final resolution is still a long way off, Macedonia's president says.

Greece and Macedonia responded last week to the latest set of ideas on the naming dispute put forward by UN mediator Matthew Nimetz.

President Georgi Ivanov’s cabinet released the the statement claiming progress has been made over the weekend.

On Friday, Macedonian negotiator Zoran Jolevski handed Skopje’s response to Nimetz in New York.

Although the details of the Macedonian response were not officially disclosed, local media speculated that Skopje had largely accepted Nimetz’s idea to add the term Northern to the state’s official name, Republic of Macedonia.

In post-meeting comments, Jolevski sufficed with pointing out that his country continues to participate in efforts to end the dispute.

Greece reportedly had some complaints about the latest set of ideas in its official response, passed on earlier in the week.

Last year, Greece blocked Macedonia’s NATO entry over the row. Athens argues that Skopje’s name implies that it is making territorial claims on its northern province of Macedonia.

While Macedonian authorities fear that Athens could seek to delay the negotiations - due to possible early Greek elections - they believe Athens is unlikely to veto their country's EU accession negotiations, should the European Commission propose a date for the start thereof this autumn.

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These negotiations have become a load of bollocks.
I read with interest that the Fyrom president says that a final resolution is still a long way off.....Dont expect anything before 2069 me figures.

Make that 2096 instead.

FYROM is in a very vulnerable position. You'd think they'd be doing anything short of selling their mammies on the open market to get into the EU/Nato asap.

Western thrid of this statelet breaks to Albania , kosovo style. The rest split up between the other neighbors, most going to Bulgaria.

Within the decade. Czechoslovakia 1939 style.

I certainly dont want this state to split,nor do i want turmoil there.it would be good to see the people living there prosper and live in peace.What bugs me is the continual publications of maps showing that their state is incomplete without the greek and bulgarian part ,and of claims that people in history,belong to them when clearly some of these figures are greek.
I also dont think greece has the right to exclusive rights to the name of macedonia,whereby a compromise is necessary.Something along the lines of what recent greek governments have been proposing would make me a happy camper

Greek Opposition Vows to Resolve Name Spat

Skopje | 02 September 2009 | Sinisa-Jakov Marusic

Greece's main opposition party, the Panhellenic Socialist Party, PASOK, will take a different course in resolving the naming dispute with neighbouring Macedonia should it win fresh polls.

"When PASOK comes to power we will solve the issue .We will be sending a message of reconciliation, not of confrontation,“ PASOK's Andreas Loverdos, told Greek news portal Newstime.gr on Wednesday.

Loverdos, who served as deputy premier from 2002 to 2004, blames the ruling conservative New Democracy party for transforming differences over the naming issue into a full-blown confrontation with Skopje.

Last year, Athens blocked Skopje's NATO entrance over the long-standing dispute, seriously damaging bilateral relations. Athens argues that its neighbour's official name, Republic of Macedonia, implies that Skopje is making territorial claims to Greece's northern province of Macedonia.

Loverdos says that Greek Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyannis is making a mistake by not engaging in direct talks with Skopje and instead leaving the matter of finding a mutually acceptable compromise to UN mediator Matthew Nimetz.

As a sign of good will, "PASOK will accept the return to Greece of Slavmacedonian refugees who left the country after the civil war", Loverdos added. Slavmacedonians is the name used by some Greek officials to refer to Macedonians.

Skopje demands the return of the refugees, who fought on the side of the Democratic Army of Greece, the military branch of the Greek Communist Party, which lost the 1946-1949 civil war.

Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis recently told voters to prepare for early elections on September 16, which he hopes will see New Democracy secure a fresh mandate to overhaul Greece's financial and social systems.

Macedonia fears that Greece could move to block its EU accession process due to domestic political considerations. Athens has openly threatened to do so, pending a solution to the row.

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Next time they show a map with "macedonia" spilling over into Bulgaria/Greece, show them a map of "greater Albania" and remind them they are high on crack if they think for a moment the Albanians will continue to live in a united state with them, when Albania is right next door and they already suceeded in Kosovo.

Bulgaria started the 2nd Balkan war over Skopjie because they felt so strongly it was their territory and the people there where Bulgarians (the language is 100 percent identical, and ALL the revolutionary leaders from that area from the middle ages to up to 80 years ago always called themselves Bulgarians).

These Bulgarians in Skopjie where brainwashed by Serbia/Tito, who obviously wanted to teach them to be non-Bulgarians so to better protect "southernn Serbian/Skopjie" from anymore Bulgarian dreams of reuniting that area with Bulgaria.

Skopjie is 33 percent Muslim, most of them living in the western parts of the country. So after they join Albania/Kosovo maybe 1 million bulgarian speaking slavs will be left in the eastern part of the country. They can then live in their tiny little isolated country, kept out of the rest of europe by Greece, or they can rejoin Bulgaria, their country men. Greece would reclaim Bitola area.

A united Skopjie is a long term impossibility. There is just no way in hell the 33 percent of the muslims in the west will not join "greater Albania", especially after Kosovo joins Albania , which it is slowly prepareing itself to do. The small parts of north Kosovo where the serbs live will obviously then rejoin Serbia, and the same thing will happen with eastern Skopjie to Bulgaria.

Greece should continue to keep the pressure on, not backing down from the name disbute one moment. If those gangsters in Skopjie are hard headed and refuse to chage the name, they will only bring about the splitting of that country faster.

I say it again, these people are 100 percent pure BULGARIAN in language and ethnicity (even the endings on their last names match the Bulgarian tradition 100 percent). They need to forget the communist propaganda and correct the mistake that was made in 2nd Balkan war and rejoin Bulgaria.

-Western third of country to Albania
-Bitola area to Greece
-Rest to rejoin Bulgaria

End of story, one less political clique to try and manipulate the people and cause trouble in the Balkans.

classic .


nico and the Greeks find it 'too much' for a country to call themselves 'macedonia', yet they turn around become staunch supporters of a breakup of another country with a straight face.

the hypocrisy.

No deal.

post deleted...Foiled by Evro once again
I'll get you one day.....LOL

EU nod for FYROM despite name

Thursday October 15, 2009

European Union Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn announced yesterday that Brussels had approved the launch of accession negotiations between the EU and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), despite ongoing negotiations aimed at solving the dispute over FYROM’s official name.

Noting that FYROM “has made convincing progress and substantially addressed reform priorities,” Rehn said the former Yugoslav republic now “sufficiently meets” the political and economic criteria for opening negotiations.

Meanwhile, it emerged that Stavros Dimas, the Greek EU environment commissioner, had expressed his opposition to the move in a letter sent to Brussels.

Perhaps in response to this letter, Rehn added that he viewed the launch of talks with FYROM as “a very strong encouragement to settle the name issue and thus remove this from the agenda, and I trust that the government in Skopje gets this message as well.” Reacting to Rehn’s comments, FYROM Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski said, “We are aware of the importance of this report and... will actively and constructively negotiate and seek a solution with Greece under the United Nations auspices.”

Rehn also revealed that the EC was dissatisfied with the progress made by Turkey, another candidate for membership.

He called on Ankara to “revitalize” reform in the areas of “freedom of expression” and “women’s rights” and also stressed Turkey’s obligation as an EU member state to open its air and sea ports to EU member Cyprus, whose northern half is occupied by Turkish troops.

In a related development, the new PASOK Foreign Ministry made its first complaint to Ankara after Turkish authorities sent radar warnings to an aircraft of Frontex, the EU’s border-monitoring agency, that had been conducting a patrol in the Aegean as part of the organization’s efforts to curb the influx of illegal immigrants into Europe. The harassment of the Finnish aircraft, which came on the same day as a visit to Athens by a senior Frontex official, was the fifth incident of its kind in just over a month, according to Greek defense officials.

The pilots of the Frontex aircraft, which was harassed while flying east of Farmakonisi, in the eastern Aegean, ignored the Turkish radar warnings and completed their patrol as scheduled, Greek defense officials said.

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Greek official says Macedonia's road to EU goes through Greece

Athens, / 14.10.09

"The European path of Macedonia passes through Greece," Greek Deputy Foreign Minister Dimitris Droutsas said Tuesday.

We've set a strict and clear national red line, Droutsas told Greek media on the occasion of the European Commission's recommendation for start of accession negotiations with Macedonia.

Droutsas stressed the Greece has already made clear its stance that all Western Balkan's countries should become members of EU by 2014, under condition they meet the membership criteria.

In the case of Skopje, that means that a settlement over the name has to be reached with Athens, Droutsas said.

As regards the launch of pre-accession procedures, I have to underline that it falls under the competence of all EU members, therefore, of Greece as well, Droutsas added.

A candidate-country can start the negotiations for fully-fledged membership in EU only upon consensus of all 27 member-countries of the Union.

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