Prime Minister Andrej Plenković makes an official visit to North Macedonia

During his visit to North Macedonia on Tuesday the Croatian Prime Minister reiterated his belief that North Macedonia's European membership has been unfairly blocked for more than twenty years.

Prime Minister Andrej Plenković was received by his North Macedonian counterpart Hristijan Mickoski in Ohrid, where the two men signed an Agreement on Strategic Cooperation in the areas of energy, economy, security and European integration.

"The most important thing is that this agreement opens up space for connecting institutions, companies, and investors from both countries. We want this cooperation to bring concrete results and not just remain at the level of political cooperation, to enable new investments, economic growth, and to create jobs, all of which then enables a better life and standard of living for everyone," Prime Minister Mickoski said.

"Our agreement represents an incentive for the development of greater economic cooperation. I would like to remind you that in recent years Croatia has made significant investments here. This strategic framework will allow us to accelerate this and increase their visibility in Croatia. The companies that came here came for a reason. First, they know the market, second, they have partners, and I think those who are looking for partners will be able to find them," added Prime Minister Plenković.

Plenković also once again noted Croatia’s strong support for North Macedonia's membership of the European Union. North Macedonia has been in accession limbo since 2005, when it became an official candidate for accession. The then-Republic of Macedonia submitted its membership application in 2004, and is one of nine current EU candidate countries, along with Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia, Turkey and Ukraine.

Initially Greece blocked its accession over the use of the name "Macedonia," which resulted in a Greek veto against opening EU and NATO accession talks. This lasted from 2008 to 2019. After the issue was resolved, the EU gave its formal approval to begin accession talks with North Macedonia and Albania in March of 2020. However, in November of 2020, Bulgaria effectively blocked the official start of North Macedonia's EU accession negotiations over what it perceives as slow progress on the implementation of the 2017 friendship treaty between the two countries, state-supported or tolerated hate speech and minority claims towards Bulgaria.

Source: HRT