Skopje seeks an official Mucunski–Petrova-Chamova meeting in Sofia: unblocking dialogue after von der Leyen’s advice

Skopje has officially requested a meeting between chief diplomat Timcho Mucunski and Bulgaria’s Foreign Minister Velislava Petrova-Chamova, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade confirmed to the state news agency, as the Kolegium portal writes.

If accepted, the meeting will be organised next week in Sofia, on the margins of the ministerial meeting dedicated to Corridor 8, transport and infrastructure projects involving both countries.

The request comes after today’s visit to Skopje by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who advised Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski that the two countries’ ministers should seek a bilateral meeting. “From the President I received advice – next week our foreign minister is in Sofia, the reason is Corridor 8 and the projects we are moving forward within that corridor, to ask the host for a meeting on a bilateral basis. I immediately asked the minister to send a diplomatic note and request a time for a meeting with his colleague and start the process somewhere,” Mickoski said.

Mucunski himself has also spoken about this request, while from Sofia there was no objection: the Bulgarian side stressed that Bulgaria remains open to constructive dialogue with North Macedonia, while the country’s accession process is a European issue.

Relations between the two countries cooled in 2020, when Sofia vetoed the country’s negotiating framework because of disputes over language, history and the Bulgarian minority. With the mediation of European partners a compromise was found and on 19 July 2022 the country held its First Intergovernmental Conference with the EU, but to hold the second and open chapters, the Assembly must approve constitutional changes – the current government in Skopje says it will not enter this process without guarantees that there will be no new bilateral conditions from the Bulgarian side.