As Northern Macedonia progresses in the European Union integration process, it appears that a new blockade is set by neighboring Bulgaria due to disagreements over History issues. Bulgaria has managed to prevent Brussels from approving the negotiating framework with Skopje, delaying an intergovernmental conference with the European Union, where Macedonian authorities hoped to get a final date for the opening of talks.
Sofia has already presented other conditions, in addition to those that are part of the good neighborly agreement with its western neighbor and that has to do with historical figures, on whose ethnicity solutions are being sought in Skopje and Sofia. One of these figures is Goce Delchev, a revolutionary of the early twentieth century. Bulgaria already insists that the Macedonian language be identified as a language rooted in Bulgarian or a dialect of it, codified by Yugoslav and Macedonian communist officials after World War II, according to the Bulgarian side - an unacceptable condition for Skopje.
According to media reports in Brussels, the EU will wait for some progress to be made between Bulgaria and North Macedonia on these disputes to proceed with the intergovernmental conference. Skopje expects help from German Chancellor Angela Merkel and the commitment of Enlargement Commissioner Oliver Varhelyi to reach a compromise.
The Bulgarian stay in Skopje has considered a violation of the Good Neighbor Agreement between the two countries reached three years ago.
Prime Minister Zoran Zaev considered the new Bulgarian stance an unfriendly signal, saying that the Macedonian side had not violated the agreement with Bulgaria in any way and that the recent Sofia act "had created an unpleasant feeling", but that he believed it was a message to speed up the resolution of disputes being discussed between the two countries' working groups led by foreign ministries.
Analyst Xhelal Neziri says that the Bulgarian blockade was not expected, while adding that the eventual veto on the integration of North Macedonia in the EU could consequently cause space, especially for Russian influence.
"This negotiation process can last from 5 to 10 years, but what most demotivates the country, the political scene, the government, various social factors is that we are again facing another blockade, which may last as long as on the occasion of NATO integration", he says.
Mr. Neziri thinks that further delay in opening the talks could lose the credibility of public opinion here in the European Union as a system of values.
"Such a mood in public opinion, however, will be used by malignant external factors to exert their influence, in order to repel the country from European integration," says the analyst.
Authorities in Skopje, however, hope that this is not a Bulgarian veto in the European Union on the progress of North Macedonia and that a solution to the dispute will be found. Political commentators in Skopje estimate that Sofia raised these issues for domestic political purposes, before the elections.