site.btaDelyan Peevski Says North Macedonia's Deputy PM Nikoloski Should Immediately Be Declared Persona Non Grata

Delyan Peevski, one of two chairmen of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) and Floor Leader of the MRF, said that if Bulgaria has adequate state institutions and services, North Macedonia's Deputy Prime Minister and Transport Minister Aleksandar Nikoloski should immediately be declared persona non grata. Peevski's position was released on Monday by the MRF's press office.

Peevski said: "This is the least that can be done after the systematic sowing of hatred towards Bulgaria and the Bulgarian people. The insolence and arrogance towards Bulgaria and its democratically elected institutions, demonstrated by [Hristijan] Mickoski's pro-Russian government is obviously a response to Sofia's firm Euro-Atlantic stance. We demand immediate consistent and firm measures in response to the provocations." In his view, things can no longer be mended with an apology.

On Sunday, Nikoloski said in a televised interview that Bulgarian politicians demanding his resignation interfered in North Macedonia's internal affairs.

Peevski also commented: "The divide is value-based and contrasts two worlds - one of the Euro-Atlantic democracies and the other of the pro-Putin, anti-democratic threat. As a European state, we cannot remain indifferent or pseudo-diplomatic, we must defend the honour and dignity of Bulgaria and its citizens. Otherwise, we would be complicit in the legitimization of obvious agents of pro-Russian influence in the heart of Europe."

Bulgarian institutions and politicians reacted to Nikoloski's claims in a television interview in which he criticized the absence of North Macedonia's national flag at a September 13 informal meeting between Bulgarian President Rumen Radev and his counterpart Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova of the Republic of North Macedonia, who was in Sofia for an opera performance.