FYROM focusing on name deal and reforms, deputy PM says
Skopje needs to focus on the implementation of the name deal reached with Greece and on “urgent” reforms that will pave the way for the western Balkan country’s accession to the European Union, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’s (FYROM) deputy prime minister for European affairs said.
Speaking in an interview with To Ethnos newspaper’s Sunday edition, Bujar Osmani said that the people of Greece and FYROM “want to build a better future and are tired by the cockfights of the past.”
The message from the people, he said, is “don’t waste time.”
Osmani said that the deal signed last month between the two countries renaming FYROM to North Macedonia, among other changes, is “a fair compromise on both sides” but has aspects that “will be determined in practice and by our good will to move ahead.”
FYROM is preparing to put the name deal to a referendum this fall after it was approved by lawmakers in parliament, despite staunch opposition from nationalists and the country’s president.
