The EC has completed the draft negotiating framework for North Macedonia, and
presented it to the Council of the European Union. This is just a draft-document and I
expect the final-document to be adopted by October. It is good that this process is
happening during the German EU presidency, which strongly supports our European
path, Deputy PM for European Affairs Bujar Osmani said at Thursday’s news
conference.
Osmani said that this is a draft-document whereas all EU member states should
present their national positions and afterwards it should be adopted by consensus.
“This will give the EU a final position on the content of the negotiating framework and
then an inter-governmental conference is expected to be scheduled, which will mark
the formal start of the accession negotiations” Osmani said.
Osmani explained that with the new mechanisms of the negotiation process, the
speed and progress will depend on ourselves, but also that the EC will have the
mechanism to recognize and reduce access to EU funds if process comes to
standstill.
In the end, Osmani once again congratulated the historic success.
“It is clear that despite coronavirus challenges, the EU has not frozen the
enlargement process. Congratulations to Olivér Várhelyi and Ursula von der Leyen,
but also to the Croatian EU presidency. We are in the middle of a political campaign
and I hope that after July 15 we will have a stable government committed to the
European path,” Osmani said.
