Mickoski Calls on Sofia and Athens To Get Used to Skopje's New Policy

Hristijan Mickoski (BETAPHOTO/Government of North Macedonia)

North Macedonian Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski said on July 4 that Bulgarian President Rumen Radev and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis  needed to get used to Skopje's new policy which protected the interests of Macedonian citizens and saw cooperation as a two-way street.

He stressed that "gone are the times when politicians with bent backs were in the Macedonian cabinet, politicians who humiliated themselves, politicians willing to sign anything just so as not to protect the interests of Macedonian citizens, while on the other hand waving the European flag and all the while plundering the state and citizens."

This was his reply to being asked to comment on Radev's statement to the press after meeting with Mitsotakis in Athens that "the leadership of the Republic of North Macedonia is not ready" and that "the authorities in Skopje do not know constitutional law. "My message to both, who have more experience than I do, is that we are a peaceful, small people, one of the smallest in the Balkans, we are ready to cooperate and see cooperation as a two-way street. It cannot be one-sided, and on May 8, the time when cooperation with Macedonian politicians was seen as a one-way street, ended," Mickoski said.

The North Macedonian prime minister called on Radev and Mitsotakis to cooperate toward the economic development of countries and bringing peoples closer to each other, adding that a good neighborly policy was not built by "belittling and with insults."