The EU formally opened accession negotiations with North Macedonia and Albania

The European Union (EU) formally opened accession negotiations with North Macedonia and Albania today, announced the President of the European Commission (EC), Ursula von der Leyen.

"This is a historic moment," said the President of the EC.

"This is what your citizens have been waiting for for so long. This is what they deserve," she added.

North Macedonia has been a candidate for EU membership since 2005 and Albania since 2014.

"This is not the beginning of the end, but the end of the beginning," said Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama, paraphrasing British leader William Churchill to remind the numerous difficulties that the two candidate countries need to overcome.

Yesterday, the European twenty-seven approved the opening of negotiations the day after the protocol was signed between Skopje and Sofia, removing the last obstacles.

Bulgaria has blocked the start of negotiations due to historical and cultural disputes with North Macedonia. Bulgaria's position also prevented the start of negotiations with Albania, whose candidacy the EU linked to Skopje.

Edi Rama called it an "absurd situation". He welcomed the efforts of France and President Emmanuel Macron during the six-month presidency of the EU Council to formulate a compromise acceptable to Skopje and Sofia.

It is a "new beginning" for the Western Balkan region and it will be "synonymous with prosperity and progress", said Macedonian Prime Minister Dimitar Kovačeski in a long speech in Macedonian and then in English.

The agreement with Bulgaria, among other things, will enable Macedonian to become one of the official languages ​​of the EU.

Negotiations will be long for joining the EU, and membership must be ratified by the 27 member states of the Union, sometimes by organizing a referendum.

Two more countries of the Western Balkans are conducting EU accession negotiations, Serbia since 2014 and Montenegro since 2012.

The third candidate for membership, Turkey, has been negotiating since 1999, but negotiations have been "deadlocked" since 2019 due to the autocratic behavior of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and diplomatic disputes with Greece and other member countries.

The accession process was reformed in 2019 and foresees "reversibility" and pausing, i.e. suspension of negotiations in case of problems with the candidate country.

The EU has proposed the formation of a European political community to accept candidate countries and neighboring countries to discuss common issues. The first meeting of the community should be held on October 6 and 7 in Prague, diplomatic sources said.