North Macedonia’s President Gordana Siljanovska said on Wednesday that the country’s Constitutional Court will determine whether there is legal basis to proceed with a challenge to a bilateral protocol with Bulgaria, stressing that its decisions are final and not open to outside comment.
The remarks followed a letter from Bulgarian Foreign Minister Georg Georgiev to EU counterparts, in which he said the package agreement approved at the EU level in July 2022 remains the only viable path for North Macedonia’s accession to the bloc.
In August, North Macedonia’s Constitutional Court opened a case to review the constitutionality of the protocol from the second meeting of the Joint Intergovernmental Commission between the two countries. The protocol states that North Macedonia’s next EU accession negotiation conference would proceed only after Bulgarians are recognized in its constitution, a condition accepted by both countries and EU member states.
The case, initiated by former MP Liljana Popovska, seeks annulment of the protocol, citing the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties and arguing that the procedure in North Macedonia was opaque.
Siljanovska dismissed calls to adopt a new parliamentary declaration on “red lines” for EU integration, urging parties to agree on a unified approach. She emphasized that previous parliamentary declarations and the 2018 name-change referendum were not fully respected, and stressed that delayed-action constitutional amendments have precedent in North Macedonia.