Irish Prime Minister Visits Skopje, Says No Country Has Joined the EU in the Last 10 Years

The downtown of Skopje (BetaPhoto/Svetlana Dojcinovic)

Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar said during a Jan. 12 visit to Skopje that in the past 10 years not a single country had joined the European Union and that he believed that this needed to change.

“My visit to North Macedonia, and to Kosovo and Montenegro before that, demonstrates Ireland’s interest, and our commitment to this region, as well as a determination to help North Macedonia and its neighbors on their path to the European Union (EU),” Varadkar said. Speaking at a joint press conference with his Macedonian counterpart, Dimitar Kovacevski, the Taoiseach said that his country had always supported EU enlargement.

“We are looking forward to greeting North Macedonia as the next member state, and hope that its progress in accession talks will be accelerated. We are prepared to help wherever we can, especially regarding reforms,” Vardakar said. The Irish PM underlined that accession to the EU should be a national ambition, not a party or political aspiration.

Kovacevski said that process of European reform would continue, underlining that there was no force in the country to stop it, because there was no other alternative.