EU Commissioner Kos equates Macedonian national identity with the baked beans and stuffed peppers

The statement led to divided comments, with Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski noting that the Macedonian identity goes beyond the cuisine.

Our identity is Goce Delcev and Sapkarev and the Miladinovci brothers, the Ilinden Uprising, Damjan Gruev and Jane Sandaski. I don’t know if our colleagues from the east will share the same opinion, but these are the people who are part of our identity – the Macedonian identity, Mickoski said.

The Prime Minister warned thta we can now expect “all sorts of engineering” with regard to the European Parliament’s progress report, that was adopted at the committee level with references to the Macedonian national identity and language. Under strong pressure from the Bulgarian members of the European Parliament, there is now a push to remove these references from the report, or add the term “modern” in front of them – Bulgaria hopes that this will support their position that the Macedonian language and national identity were historically Bulgarian.

Regarding the progress report that is now beforee the members of the European Parliament, nothing wouldd surprise me. I would be more careful when it comes to the idenity. That is something that is deeply ingrained in us. I have to admit that we lost a good share of our identity over these past three decades, when we were changing our flag, our name, our Constitution on multiple occassions. Since we have no guarantee that this will be the last concession on identity issues that we wouldd have to do, I would be far more careful, Mickoski said.

Commissioner Kos, in her remarks, assured Macedonia that the only concession that is needed before the EU accession talks begin is to include the Bulgarian minority in the Macedonian Constitution. She insisted that Macedonia needs to be pushed forward in the accession talks and to use the current opportunity. Kos said that EU membership would be the best way to safguard the identity, culture and language of the Macedonians.

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