Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Kotzias added another parameter to the ongoing, and by all accounts, intensified negotiations towards finding a solution to the nagging “name issue” still separating Athens and Skopje, saying an agreement with the neighboring state will be in Greece’s own best national interests.
Speaking in Berlin on Tuesday with German Foreign Heiko Maas by his side, Kotzias referred to an “agreement” between Greece and its northern neighbor, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (fYRoM), in the present tense.
“An agreement with fYRoM was concluded not because the country, a friend, desires to join the European Union and NATO – something we also support – but because it is in our best national interest,” he said during a joint press briefing.
Moreover, he said work by the foreign ministers of the two countries, Nikola Dimitrov and himself, has “concluded”, adding that experts’ committees are now meeting, with the entire matter then forwarded to the respective prime ministers.
