Saturday, February 24, 2007

Gruevski says Macedonia won't cave in to Greece's pressure to change its name

Macedonia will not cave in to Greece's pressure to change its constitutional name, Macedonian PM Nikola Gruevski said today.

Giving an address before members of the Macedonian Rotary Clubs, Gruevski slammed Greece's policy as being based on blackmails.

"I don't think it's a good policy when one country blackmails a neighboring state. There was a period when Greece used to impose embargos and blockades, but it all turned futile", Gruevski said.

"The name of the Republic of Macedonia will never be changed by exerting pressures and resorting to blackmails. On the contrary, I think the right way to reach the final solution is to continue the talks in the United Nations and to restrain from putting obstacles, which by the way, is in collision with the 1995 Interim Agreement", the Prime Minister said.

As regards Kosovo, Gruevski said that Macedonia has to put its national interests as the basis for the state's policy on this issue, pointing out that any solution that is acceptable for Europe would be acceptable for Macedonia also.

He reiterated that Martti Ahtisaari's plan provides for thorough and permanent resolving of the issue of demarcation of Macedonia's northern border, Macedonian Radio reported.

Concerning the problem with communication between the government and the opposition, Gruevski accused the other side of blackmailing specifying that the opposition set four conditions for establishing of the dialogue.

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