site.btaForeign Ministry in Skopje: "French Proposal" Coordinated with Macron Success for North Macedonia's Diplomacy

The Foreign Ministry of the Republic of North Macedonia said in a statement on Thursday: "The basis of the negotiating framework of the Republic of North Macedonia with the EU was the proposal of the German EU Presidency, further developed by the Portuguese EU Presidency, to become the basis to which each EU Presidency afterwards contributed its own proposals. The final details were coordinated directly with French President Emmanuel Macron on the sidelines of the Madrid NATO Summit. In reference to the then French EU Presidency, the final proposal is now informally known as the 'French proposal', but it represents the official position of the EU agreed with the consensus of all 27 Member States, including the Republic of Bulgaria."

This statement came in reaction to Democratic Union President Pavle Trajanov's claim in Wednesday's debate on Kanal 5 that he holds information that the negotiating framework of the Republic of North Macedonia was negotiated in Mala Recica [the headquarters of the Albanian Democratic Union for Integration, DUI, the largest party of ethnic Albanians in North Macedonia] by representatives of DUI and Bulgaria.

Trajanov was interior minister (1998-1999) of the VMRO-DPMNE government. He entered the previous parliament as part of the SDSM coalition, and was part of the VMRO-DPMNE coalition in the May 8, 2024 elections.

"Although the aim [of Pavle Trajanov's claim] is partisan and political - to undermine the role of the country's diplomacy, such inappropriate speculations mostly downplay the role and credibility of the EU itself," the Foreign Ministry in Skopje said.

The success of obtaining a harmonized framework from all 27 EU Member States is a great success for the diplomacy of North Macedonia, achieved with enormous efforts and commitment, as well as for the strategic friends and allies of the Republic of North Macedonia; underestimating their work is a direct attack on the country's interests and is "fully consonant with the interests of alternative world centres of power whose interests do not include the integrative aspirations of the entire region" of the Western Balkans, the Foreign Ministry also said.