It is well known that Mr. Gruevski did not want any solution on the name issue. In order to deceive international players, he pretended that he would bow to pressure to accept a compromise. No one believed him. With the exception, after the fact, of Mr. Mitsotakis.
Today’s announcement from New Democracy rewards Mr. Gruevski for this performance.
An announcement that, in its haste, overlooks the fact that, according to U.S. files leaked on WikiLeaks, the Skopje side wanted to use its constitutional name, ‘Macedonia’, for internal use, which New Democracy had accepted at that time.
The fact that New Democracy, even today, adopts Mr. Gruevski’s hollow assurances shows that it is the fellow traveller of the person who attempted to claim Alexander the Great was Skopjan.
In reality, Mr. Gruevski on multiple occasions rejected the ‘North Macedonia’ proposal, which was submitted by the New Democracy government in its finest moments, when it wasn’t promoting plain ‘Macedonia’. The New Democracy government, through its minister at that time, argued that the best solution to the well-known problem is the name ‘North Macedonia’, which Mr. Gruevski rejected on multiple occasions between 2007 and 2009. For reasons of brinkmanship, New Democracy has a short memory. It does not remember the multiple rejections of this name in the negotiations, remembering only Nikola Gruevski’s attempt to deceive international players.
It seems that Mr. Mitsotakis wants to forget that this country has also been governed by New Democracy. I draw his attention to the fact that his rejection of the policy of Konstantinos Mitsotakis and Kostas Karamanlis on the Macedonian issue is his problem and perhaps New Democracy’s. But it will not become the country’s problem.
September 3, 2018