NATO is ready to welcome Macedonia as a new member and the decision is now up to the Macedonians to make, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Thursday on a visit to Skopje.
BELGRADE (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 06th September, 2018) NATO is ready to welcome Macedonia as a new member and the decision is now up to the Macedonians to make, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Thursday on a visit to Skopje.
"You decide your own future; that's only for you to decide ... what I can say is that NATO is ready to have you as the 30th member of the alliance," Stoltenberg said, as quoted by the NATO press release.
Stoltenberg added that NATO appreciated partnership with Macedonia. Macedonian Minister of Defense Radmila Sekerinska, in turn, remarked that 4,000 Macedonian troops have participated in NATO operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as in other missions.
Earlier in the day, the alliance chief attended the inauguration of "Stoltenberg street," honoring his father, a Norwegian diplomat who took part in rebuilding Skopje after the 1963 earthquake.
The alliance chief stressed that the close ties to NATO could help boost economic growth in Macedonia, citing the example of Montenegro, where the investment from NATO allies doubled since the country joined the alliance.
"If you implement the name agreement, we can sign the accession protocol this winter," Stoltenberg said at a joint press conference with Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev.
The path for Macedonia to join NATO was cleared when Skopje and Athens in June signed the agreement on a new name for Macedonia, the Republic of Northern Macedonia. Until then, Greece had objected to the neighbor's use of Macedonia, similar to the name of a region in Greece. Athens' objections precluded Macedonia from beginning talks on joining NATO or the European Union.
