Macedonia and the European Union

[Tomche Makedonche]

http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/eu-strategy-exacerbates-winner-loser-divide-in-balkans-02-07-2018

EU Strategy Exacerbates Winner-Loser Divide in Balkans

While the EU’s new strategy on Balkans gives Serbia and Montenegro reason for optimism about their membership, the other four countries feel out in the cold

Serbia and Montenegro have been deemed “frontrunners” in terms of EU membership in the Balkans – although an overview of the issues the individual so-called “Western Balkans six” face offers a more nuanced perspective.

“We are proud to have Serbia recognized as a leader. We worked hard for that, and will have to work even harder in the weeks, months and years ahead,” Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic said, Serbia’s national broadcaster, RTS, reported.

Montenegro’s Prime Minister Dusko Markovic, meanwhile said he believed that his country might even join the EU before 2025, which the EU Strategy sets as the year by which Serbia and Montenegro could become members.

“This is a positive signal that sends a clear message to the region that the European perspective for the Western Balkans is credible and ‘alive’,” Markovic said in Podgorica.

However, the overall assessment of the rule of law in the region in the Strategy strikes a more pessimistic tone.

It says that these countries show “clear elements of state capture”, including links with organised crime and corruption at all levels of government, as well as a strong entanglement of public and private interests.

“All this feeds a sentiment of impunity and inequality. There is also extensive political interference in and control of the media,” the Strategy says.

Many observers see the European Commission’s positive assessment of Serbia’s progress mainly as a tool to lure Belgrade closer to the EU and away from Russian influence.

While the enlargement Strategy names Serbia a “front-runner”, its EU integration process has in fact lasted for years already.

Belgrade signed a Stabilisation and Association Agreement, SAA, back in 2008 and applied for EU membership in 2009.

With 12 negotiation chapters opened but only two provisionally closed, accession even by 2025 still looks unlikely.

Montenegro has got much further.

After declaring independence from a state union with Serbia in 2006, it signed an SAA the next year and has been an EU candidate state since 2010. It has also joined NATO, in 2017.

It has since opened 30 of the 35 chapters and is thus a much clearer “front-runner” for EU membership than Serbia.

However, the European Commission has recommended a “greater use of leverage” in the negotiation framework with Montenegro, focusing on the rule of law.

Albania, Macedonia making ‘progress’:

Macedonia, by comparison, signed an SAA far back in 2001, but its EU and NATO integration has been blocked by the dispute with Greece over its name.

After a year of political turbulence brought a new government to power, Macedonia hopes for a breakthrough this year in its stalled NATO and EU accession bids, provided a compromise is reached on the long-standing “name” dispute.

“Macedonia marks considerable progress. That was the focus that was determined yesterday in the strategy,” government spokesperson Mile Bosnjakovski said in Skopje on Wednesday.

He added that the Skopje government will continue to strive for a breakthrough in the dispute with Greece over its name.

Along with Macedonia, Albania is said also to be making “significant progress” on its European path.

The Commission said it is ready to prepare recommendations to open accession negotiations with both countries.

However, Albania has long had issues in implementing EU-required judicial reforms, which have delayed the opening of chapters in its membership negotiations.

Justice reform is related to the most important chapters and, if fully implemented, would help resolve other difficulties as well.

But the last EU Progress Report, from 2016, noted weaknesses in almost every field except defence where, as a NATO member, it is considered “Well Advanced”.

Out of about 40 indicators, Albania is considered in the “early stages” in five of them, at a “low level of preparedness” in 15, and “average” in 19.

Kosovo and Bosnia far behind in membership race:

Two other countries in the region, Kosovo and Bosnia, are further behind.

A dispute between Bosnia’s two entities, the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Serb-dominated Republika Srpska, has prevented the country from even completing the EU Questionnaire – which the European Commission will use to prepare an opinion on Bosnia’s application.

About 50 questions to do with political criteria appear to contain major problems, though this has not been officially confirmed.

Republika Srpska has meanwhile refused to recognise the data from the national census published in 2016, which is one of the problems with the questionnaire.

Besides that, Republika Srpska does not wish to take part in the country’s working groups on EU integration, claiming that they were not defined within the Coordination Mechanism, which is also seen as a reason why the questionnaire is not ready.

“We need to implement the reforms to create a better and safer society for all citizens, without anyone scoring political points,” the chairman of Bosnia’s Council of Ministers, Denis Zvizdic, told the news website Klix.ba.

Kosovo is even more left out of the process, mainly owing to continuing disputes over its independence, which Serbia and some other countries reject.

It signed an SAA in 2015, but it has still not met the EU criteria for visa liberalisation, after failing to ratify a border deal with Montenegro.

It is also not clear even if the country can launch EU membership negotiations, when it remains unrecognized by five EU member states – Greece, Cyprus, Romania, Slovakia and Spain.

The EU Strategy notes the need for a legally binding agreement to resolve relations with Serbia, which still claims Kosovo as part of its territory.

Kosovo President Hashim Thaci complained on Facebook that the enlargement strategy does not provide Kosovo with any clarity about its European future.

“For well-known political reasons, unfortunately, this document has failed to present a perspective of inclusive and equal membership for all countries in the region. In particular, this strategy has failed to provide clarity for Kosovo's EU membership,” he said.

[Tomche Makedonche]

NOTE: Racial slurs have been edited, edits noted in Italic

http://greece.greekreporter.com/2018/02/07/hahn-ending-macedonia-dispute-no-guarantee-of-eu-status-for-skopje/

Hahn: Ending ‘Macedonia’ Dispute No Guarantee of EU Status for Macedonia

Even if the name row between the Republic of Macedonia and Greece was resolved, Macedonia would still not meet all the conditions for EU membership a senior European official has said.

Commissioner for European Neighborhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations, Johannes Hahn made the claim during a presentation of the EU’s Strategy for the Western Balkans in Strasbourg.

“In the first phase, there is no question of Macedonia's membership [of] the EU yet, but it is [at] an initial negotiation stage,” Hahn said in response to a question by the Athens-Macedonian News Agency (AMNA).

The EU commissioner said Macedonia has many more issues to resolve.

“Macedonia must meet a large list of conditions and reforms that are essentially domestic affairs, such as reforming the justice system, its secret services legislation, and the mass media sector. The list is long. The package is big and they have a lot of work to do before an assumed membership,” he said

[Phoenix]

http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/arti...ans-02-07-2018

EU Strategy Exacerbates Winner-Loser Divide in Balkans


...Many observers see the European Commission’s positive assessment of Serbia’s progress mainly as a tool to lure Belgrade closer to the EU and away from Russian influence...

I strongly believe that this is the driver of EU and NATO interest in the countries of the Western Balkans.
This is the ONLY reason a pissant like Montenegro was fast tracked into NATO and will be amongst the first of this group to gain EU membership as well.

If Macedonia wants to desperately join NATO and the EU they have chosen the wrong strategy.
Zaev's treasonous strategy of kissing Western butt and his shameless willingness to
sell down the river the Macedonian identity has highlighted his pathetic weakness as a leader and he will always be considered the path of least resistance in any negotiation with the greeks.

Gruevski was ultimately removed from power due to his posturing toward Moscow, Zaev should have continued building relations with Russia and played geo-politics to Macedonia's advantage...if both parties shared a common strategy, the West would have to rethink its treatment of Macedonia...instead he is nothing more than their puppet, willing to sell the farm to the lowest bidder.

[Pelagonija]

I strongly believe that this is the driver of EU and NATO interest in the countries of the Western Balkans.
This is the ONLY reason a pissant like Montenegro was fast tracked into NATO and will be amongst the first of this group to gain EU membership as well.

If Macedonia wants to desperately join NATO and the EU they have chosen the wrong strategy.
Zaev's treasonous strategy of kissing Western butt and his shameless willingness to
sell down the river the Macedonian identity has highlighted his pathetic weakness as a leader and he will always be considered the path of least resistance in any negotiation with the greeks.

Gruevski was ultimately removed from power due to his posturing toward Moscow, Zaev should have continued building relations with Russia and played geo-politics to Macedonia's advantage...if both parties shared a common strategy, the West would have to rethink its treatment of Macedonia...instead he is nothing more than their puppet, willing to sell the farm to the lowest bidder.

Playing the west against the east strategy worked well for TITO and currently the Serbian gov is using a similar strategy with unknown long term results. If the Serbs weren't such rednecks and the macos weren't retarded I'd opt for these two countries to support each other and pivot to the east. Of course the CIA would start an Albanian rebellion. After what the Russians did in Syria I'd say fark NATO this ain't 1999.

Don't believe western media that Russia is evil. Russia is just an economic competitor and the west will try everything to eliminate competition.

[Phoenix]

...Don't believe western media that Russia is evil. Russia is just an economic competitor and the west will try everything to eliminate competition.

Russia probably remains as the nation with the most economic and therefor military potential on the planet...forget China and India, Russia has massive untapped natural resources and wealth and if they can ever get their shit together, they pose the greatest challenge to US hegemony.

[Tomche Makedonche]

Macedonia Hopes for 'Miracle' Over EU Membership Talks

http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/macedonia-albania-hope-to-persuade-eu-enlargement-skeptics-05-28-2018

Macedonia Hopes for 'Miracle' Over EU Membership Talks

Macedonia's Foreign Minister said in Brussels that he was not dissuaded by some EU member states' doubts about granting his country a start to EU accession talks this year

“Miracles are possible,” Macedonian Foreign Minister Nikola Dimitrov said on Monday in Brussels, when asked to comment on the skepticism voiced by several EU member states about granting his country a start to accession talks this year.

Dimitrov, who is attending the EU Foreign Affairs Council on Monday and Tuesday in Brussels, told Macedonia’s state MIA news agency that, as expected, France and The Netherlands were the EU member states that were most skeptical about granting his country accession talks this year.

“It is good that we are aware that this is not simple … the EUs internal consolidation is complementary and not opposed to the consolidation of the Balkans,” Dimitrov said.

He expressed hope that an anticipated breakthrough in the talks between Macedonia and Greece over Macedonia's name would persuade the sceptics otherwise.

“If this historical breakthrough does happen, it will be an opportunity for the whole of Europe to create success. We are not in a position to have the luxury of missing historic opportunities,” Dimitrov told MIA.

The European Commission this year recommended opening negotiations with Albania and Macedonia. They hope for a green light for EU accession talks at the EU summit in June.

But several countries including France, The Netherlands and Germany visibly failed to commit to this process at the recent EU-Western Balkans summit held in Sofia in mid-May.

French President Emmanuel Macron told the summit that he did not favour any such movement until “we have all certainties and genuine reforms done”.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that the question of enlargement “remains for the June EU Summit”.

On returning from the Sofia Summit, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama blamed the EU's internal troubles for a possible negative decision on opening negotiations with Albania and Macedonia.

"It is visible, and we didn't need to go to Sofia to learn that, at the present time, our agendas are not fully compatable," he said.

“The EU is at the height of an internal debate and this doesn't help our objective. However, I remain optimistic," he added.

An alleged draft document, supposedly proposed by several EU countries, leaked last weekend in the Macedonian media, caused further uncertainty.

The alleged document advised the European Union to postpone giving green light to Albania’s and Macedonia’s accession talks this year, stating that they are not ready.

In the case of Albania, the document stated that the country lacks sufficient judicial reforms, and lags behind in the fight against corruption and organized crime.

In the case of Macedonia, the document noted that despite, changes in the general atmosphere in the country, the country cannot demonstrate clear progress in the implementation of its urgent reform priorities.

It notes that the judicial reforms are still “underway”, that de-politization of the state administration is slow, and says the fight against corruption and organized crime has not yet yielded sufficient results.

[Tomche Makedonche]

https://www.euscoop.com/en/2018/5/29/macedonia-name-effect-on-europe

Mogherini: Macedonia's New Name Will Have an Effect on Countries in Europe

Sofia, Bulgaria - "I was informed by the Macedonian and Greek Foreign Ministers about the progress in the name talks, which is very encouraging and promising, but it is not yet finalized, I am optimistic, and even more optimistic when it comes to the Balkans. Step by step, we expressed our clear intention of joining, helping and supporting a possible agreement in the coming days or weeks. The EU expects it in order to join it when it is reached and announced."

This was stated by the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Federica Mogherini, following the EU ministerial council on the resistance of some Member States to start negotiations with Macedonia.

Mogherini said that it would be very difficult for them to ignore such an important world news.

"This will have a transformative effect not only on the relations between the countries but also on all countries - both in Europe and globally." The name dispute has long existed, creating complications for years, and if a strong UN-led political leadership and EU involvement can result in negotiations on this difficult issue, it will be an inspiration to others, and it will be proof that the multilateral approach is what we should invest in, all of which must be recognized by the European Council, comentеd Mogherini.

Regarding France's resistance to the start of talks with Macedonia, Mogherini replied: "The strength of the good news that the name resolution will bring, will be so hailed by the international community, and the EU, that all states will have to take this into account."

[Risto the Great]

Macedonia Hopes for 'Miracle' Over EU Membership Talks

Miracles happen in Macedonia every day. Just not for Macedonians.

[Stojacanec]

Lets see France and Germany pour even 10% of the money they lend Greece into Macedonia, then you will see some reforms happen.

Then maybe the French and Germans won't be so sceptical.

Or rather. Don't lend greece any money and we'll see how well they stand on their own two feet.

[Risto the Great]

Lets see France and Germany pour even 10% of the money they lend Greece into Macedonia, then you will see some reforms happen.

Do you think they even care?
The idea is to promote modern day serfdom. They hock up the country, let the politicians in power at the time skim some money, then squeeze the country into servitude. That's it. Nothing to do with some kind of European utopia. Macedonia will do nothing useful with any money it ever will get from the EU. Macedonians wish they can thieve as much as the Greeks did. They won't have the same chance.

[Stojacanec]

Do you think they even care?
The idea is to promote modern day serfdom. They hock up the country, let the politicians in power at the time skim some money, then squeeze the country into servitude. That's it. Nothing to do with some kind of European utopia. Macedonia will do nothing useful with any money it ever will get from the EU. Macedonians wish they can thieve as much as the Greeks did. They won't have the same chance.

Your right, they don't care. It has never been an even playing field.

[Bill77]

Hungarian PM VictorOrbán produced a video message on June 2nd supporting the efforts of Macedonia to block a solution to the long-standing name dispute with Greece. He praised its refusal to bend “under pressure from foreign powers"
https://www.balkaninsider.com/orban-...cedonian-name/

Complete hypocrisy that majority of the media and EU leaders on social media all of a sudden are surprised that foreign entities are involved in campaigning. They were hush when past US admin was reorganizing Macedonia but now are stung that Orban sent a little message.

[Tomche Makedonche]

For Macedonia, Is Joining NATO and the EU Worth the Trouble?

https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/09/13/for-macedonia-is-joining-nato-and-the-eu-worth-the-trouble/

For Macedonia, Is Joining NATO and the EU Worth the Trouble?

A referendum could decide whether the country will change its name to gain entrance. But those prizes have lost their shine.

When the Greek and Macedonian prime ministers signed an agreement on June 17 to resolve a long-standing dispute between the two countries about Macedonia’s official name, it was clear that a long and bumpy road was still ahead. The Greeks have long found the use of the name “Republic of Macedonia” unacceptable. They see it as a way for the Balkan nation to assert a claim to the region in northern Greece that is also called Macedonia and as a way to imply ownership over ancient Macedonia, which Greeks claim as part of their own heritage.

For Macedonians, Greece’s refusal to accept the name has been seen as unfair—a denial of their country’s national identity. Now that two leaders have come to a detente on the naming issue, the biggest hurdle ahead is an upcoming referendum on the issue in Macedonia on Sept. 30.

The government has urged citizens to vote “yes” on the following question: “Do you support EU and NATO membership by accepting the agreement between Macedonia and Greece?” The fact that the poll doesn’t even include the country’s new proposed name—Republic of North Macedonia—is telling. The new name of the country, which is now known as either the Republic of Macedonia (domestically and in bilateral relations with most countries) or “the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia” (to Greece and in international organizations), is no secret. The fact that it has been left off the ballot, though, shows how contentious the issue still is among Macedonians.

Even as the referendum de-emphasizes the new name, it highlights what is at stake and why the Macedonian government invested considerable energy in resolving the dispute.

Without an agreement with Greece, Macedonia cannot join NATO or the European Union. Its southern neighbor has vetoed previous such attempts. Macedonia was unable to sign on with NATO a decade ago, for example, when it was supposed to become a member aside Croatia and Albania. Similarly, together with Croatia, it was a front-runner for EU accession in the early 2000s, but its membership application got stuck due to Greek objections.

The blockages encouraged Macedonia’s previous government, led by Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski and his nationalist VMRO-DPMNE party, to effectively abandon Euro-Atlantic integration in the late 2000s. It instead engaged in a radical nationalist revamping of the capital, complete with a steep decline in democracy and the rule of law and a massive uptick in graft.

The current government, led by current Prime Minister Zoran Zaev and dominated by his Social Democratic Union party, came to power last year after massive protests, new elections, criminal proceedings, and international mediation. It immediately understood that the key to turning Macedonia around would be unlocking NATO and EU membership. Membership in those organizations, the new government believed, would revitalize and lock in place the country’s reform efforts and restore investor confidence.

But the challenge for the government lay not only in cutting a good deal with Greece, which has considerably fewer incentives to compromise than Macedonia, but also in getting domestic support. The party’s majority is narrow. From the onset, it has been hounded by the VMRO-DPMNE for its supposed lack of patriotism and for selling out to the Albanians, a large minority in the country whose support the party needed to form a coalition, although VMRO-DPMNE had also joined in coalition with the Albanian parties.

To give itself a greater mandate to negotiate a deal with Greece, the Social Democrats accepted the demand of the previous government that any compromise agreement would be followed by a referendum.

That’s particularly tricky, because Macedonian law requires a 50 percent turnout for a referendum to be considered valid. The country’s existing voter register is believed to be widely off the mark. At the moment, it suggests that there are 1.8 million registered voters in a country of just over 2 million inhabitants. The number is impossibly high and is likely due to inaccuracies that have accumulated over the years as people who have died or migrated have remained on the roster. Either way, reaching 900,000 votes in a country that, at most, has about 1.5 million voters will be a challenge.

VMRO-DPMNE has been equivocal about the referendum. Although it opposes the agreement, it publicly favors both EU and NATO membership, and its new party president, Hristijan Mickoski, has neither endorsed the vote nor called for a boycott. It directed each individual to decide “with their conscience” whether to participate.

Other opponents have openly urged their supporters to stay away from the polls, which will make reaching the 900,000-vote threshold all the more difficult. Their reasons are eclectic. The most common, advanced by nationalist groups and some diaspora organizations and intellectuals, is the supposed threat to national identity of changing the country’s name. Even though the agreement with the Greeks does allow the country to use the adjective “Macedonian” to describe its citizens and language, critics claim that adding the geographical designator “North” in front of “Macedonia” in the name of the country constitutes a real threat.

Others bemoan that the new international license plate abbreviation will no longer be MK or MKD, but NM or NMK. And it will surely be a headache for Macedonia to issue new documents—such as drivers’ licenses, stamps, and money—over a five-year period. The public, meanwhile, won’t like the ban on an earlier version of the national flag, which was based on the Vergina Sun, a symbol associated with an ancient Macedonian royal dynasty. Although that imagery has not been on the official Macedonian flag since 1995, it remains widely used in protests and can still be found in many public spaces, including on manhole covers.

Beyond these more quotidian concerns, the Macedonian government has also committed itself to review all monuments and buildings that evoke the country’s Hellenic heritage, with an eye toward removing them. The review will include many of the monuments that the previous government erected in the capital, Skopje, and elsewhere around the country, including most prominently a large equestrian statue of a “warrior on a horse,” widely understood to be Alexander the Great.

These monuments have been controversial since their inception, not just for their cost and the corruption surrounding them but also for their nationalist message, dubious aesthetic value, and low quality.

Their implicit claim—which is not backed up by any serious historical evidence and was not part of national narratives until a decade or so ago—is that today’s Macedonians are linked to ancient Macedonians like Alexander. That idea has hardened the conflict with Greece. When the Gruevski government lost power, it was assumed that some of these statues—hundreds crowd the center of the city—would be dismantled. However, for the nationalists, such a concession is now unacceptable.

Other opponents reject the agreement not so much for its content as for the very idea that Greece has managed to get its way. As they see it, Greece, a much larger country and a member of NATO and the EU, used its leverage with those institutions to bully Macedonia over the last 27 years. Any compromise would thus be unacceptable. This position found support in a 2011 decision of the International Court of Justice, which ruled that Greece should not have blocked Macedonia from joining NATO under the name “the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.” But it does not resolve the actual conundrum on how to join NATO or the EU.

Finally, opponents on the left and some on the nationalist right oppose the agreement on the grounds that NATO membership is not even desirable for Macedonia and EU membership is not realistic.

It is true that NATO membership might seem to offer few tangible benefits to citizens.

For critics, joining the club will come with major costs—including necessary upgrades for the army. It would also involve Macedonia more deeply in the dispute between Russia and the West, an uncomfortable place for a small country in the Balkans. Supporters, meanwhile, emphasize the stabilizing effects of membership and a possible reduction of Russian influence. Either way, membership may well be within reach. NATO invited Macedonia to begin accession procedures on July 12, just weeks after the initial agreement was signed. If it is ratified, Macedonia could join in the coming year. That would require ratification in all NATO member parliaments, which seems fairly likely.

EU membership turns out to be more complicated. The European Commission hoped to start accession talks quickly as a reward to Macedonia. The commission received Greece’s support at an EU summit in late June. But France and the Netherlands objected to beginning talks this year and insisted that Macedonia and Albania both be given June 2019 as prospective start date. The difference is mostly symbolic, because the EU can already begin preparing for what will be a long, complicated procedure. Yet the organization’s failure to offer an immediate start to talks weakened the Macedonian government’s ability to gain domestic support for the deal with Greece. If the referendum were to fail, the prospect of beginning talks next year would be off the table. No wonder that 22 percent of citizens, according to a recent international republican institute poll, do not believe that their country will ever join the EU.

What’s more, the EU is no longer as attractive as it was 15 years ago, when Macedonia was a front-runner. Well before the global economic and financial crisis, the Greek bailout, Brexit, and the refugee crises, citizens of the Western Balkans widely saw joining the union as a guarantee for prosperity and stability. Today, it is seen somewhat differently. The EU is certainly no longer an automatic economic gold mine, but it is still probably safer to be inside it than outside.

Somewhat paradoxically, joining may be way to enhance sovereignty, because it protects from Russian meddling. And so, unlike Serbia, where citizens’ interest in EU membership has sharply declined in recent years, it remains strong in Macedonia.

For now, a recent survey suggested that 57 percent of Macedonians do support joining the EU and NATO under the new name. And a slightly lower 49 percent have declared their intent to actually turn out and vote in favor. With most opponents calling for a boycott, it seems clear that the referendum is likely to end with “yes” in the lead, but with turnout below the threshold for the referendum to actually count. If the referendum does end ambiguously, it will be hard to predict the consequences. Formally, the referendum is merely consultative and the parliament will decide what to do independently of the outcome.

However, it would need a two-thirds majority to ratify the name changes, which the sitting government lacks. A “yes” vote, even one that doesn’t cross the 900,000-vote threshold, might persuade opposition deputies to vote in favor. International pressure will also be key.

If the hurdles in Macedonia are cleared, Greece will then have to ratify the agreement as well, and the current Greek government also lacks a clear mandate for doing so. Its junior coalition partner, the far-right Independent Greek party, rejected the agreement on the grounds that any future name for the country that includes the word “Macedonia” is unacceptable. With parliamentary elections around the corner, it is hard to see that party backing down. Still, the Alexis Tsipras administration is likely to muster enough support from centrist members of parliament to carry the vote. Considering the strong international support for the agreement and the fact that Macedonia will have already done the heavy lifting, it seems likely to pass.

Whatever happens next, it is clear that the June deal is an opportunity to transform the relationship between Macedonia and Greece. Not only was Greek support for Macedonia strong and heartfelt at the June EU summit, as EU officials have noted, the agreement also outlines a whole range of cooperation between the two countries, which suggests that the governments are committed to making the agreement not just a cold peace but rather a starting point for a friendlier future. If that happens, it would be a real turning point in the region, where too often tensions are just tools for political elites who enjoy having nationalist conflicts to distract from the real business of governing.

[Big Bad Sven]

It will be 10 years until macedonia gets even looked at for getting into the EU and thats if the macedonians be good goys i mean good guys and submit to every bat shit insane demand from the EU.

Also, you can bet that there will be more demands from Greece, and the Bulgaria will surely ask for 'concessions' for allowing NorthernROM in the EU.

PS - With the exception of Slovenia and maybe Lithuania, all former communist countries new to the EU are struggling and wish they could get out of the EU

[Gocka]

I don't think the EU ever expected this to happen. I don't think even they thought we would end up being such spineless sellouts.

Macedonia rightfully shouldn't be granted EU membership. Macedonia is a shit hole that is light years away from the core EU countries. I think they regret hastily accepting countries like Bulgaria and don't want to make those mistakes again.

Macedonia has no economy. A fucked up legal system and no independent judiciary. Corruption and crime is rampant. It can loosely be considered a democracy, certainly not a functioning one. There is no press freedom, or at least no independent press. The infrastructure is shit, the schools are shit. The populace is under-educated and under-qualified for most modern work. The baking system is one decline away from collapse.

If I were the EU, I would not grant Macedonia membership.