The 11th meeting of the North Macedonia-Bulgaria joint commission on historical and educational issues ended with no results, historians Dragi Gjorgiev and Angel Dimitrov, co-chairs of the commission, told an online press conference Friday.
“We have to conclude, unfortunately, that the 11th meeting is zero, not a single miniature step has been made. The signals we already had were unfortunately confirmed by today ‘s meeting, and one of them is related to a seemingly technical point, but essentially political. This is the refusal of our colleagues to sign the minutes after the 7th meeting. They insisted on using the adjective “Macedonian” everywhere. But blocking the signing of the minutes casts doubts over our work, because having no document on discussions being held and decisions being reached, makes things seem uncertain and indicate a lack of desire to work more intensively and with more results. Unfortunately, our observations show that this new position of our colleagues is part of a political attitude, of a conviction to discredit Bulgaria and the state positions that began last year,” Angelov said.
According to him, as regards the essence of their work, it has been reported in Macedonia that the joint commission had decided on three periods, including in addition to ancient history, the Middle Ages and even the early Ottoman period in the Balkans. However, Angelov pointed out, the commission is far from it in relation to textbooks for 7th grade students on the Middle Ages.
“Our remarks were about 14 points, we are now at the 4th point. It is related to Czar Samuel and ended with no result and shows a deviation from a joint text already prepared for the two governments to jointly honor such a historical figure. I would very much like that next year we really do what is expected from us due to the signed Friendship Treaty,” said Dimitrov.
According to Dragi Gjorgiev, the meeting took place in an academic atmosphere with a fruitful and multifaceted discussion which unfortunatley, he pointed out, did not bring any results.
“In that regard, I can agree with Dimitrov that there are no results from the meeting, but sometimes when there’s no results it shows something,” Gjorgiev said.
He noted that a good part of the meeting focused on two minutes from the 9th and 10th meetings, and the main issue was the use of the adjective “Macedonian”, which is related to a different interpretation of the Prespa Agreement by the Bulgarian colleagues.
“This was included in the commission after the 6th meeting, we weren’t informed as a party about it, but the Bulgarian colleagues started practicing that way of making minutes without it being shared with us and without our Ministry being informed, perhaps consultations with the Ministry would have contributed to overcoming the issue. For now, the issue with the adjective ‘Macedonian’ remains. It is being discussed at a higher level and I hope that a solution will be found,” Gjorgiev said.
No agreement has been reached regarding the joint commission’s work in terms of Czar Samuel in 7th grade history textbooks, and the main problem, according to Gjorgiev, is avoiding introduction of multiperspectivity in history textbooks.
In terms of the adjective ‘Macedonian’, Angel Dimitrov commented that it is not a matter of Bulgarian view of the Prespa Agreement at all, but, according to him, it is a matter of replacing a thesis, i.e. insisting that in the work of the joint commission someone is questioning the identity and language of the citizens of Macedonia.
“That’s not true. If there are any remarks, then they are related to the path towards the formation of the nation and the identity and the history that a modern language has, these are two qualities of different things and there is no need for speculation with people’s emotions,” Dimitrov said.
The co-chairs agreed they have different views on the interpretation of the past to the Middle Ages, as well as Czar Samuel.
According to Gjorgiev, the issue with the adjective ‘Macedonian’ is that they can’t reach an agreement with their Bulgarian colleagues over the context in which the adjective should and shouldn’t be used, in line with the Prespa Agreement.
“We’re not disputing that everything related to statehood and arising from the state itself, such as in ‘Commission of North Macedonia’, ‘Government of North Macedonia’, cannot be registered in the minutes as ‘Macedonian Government’ or ‘Macedonian Commission’. But we have a certain misunderstanding when it comes to ‘Macedonian cultural tradition’, ‘Macedonian history’, ‘Macedonian language’, ‘Macedonian people’,” Gjorgiev said.
He added that another meeting will be held next week in a smaller format in order to overcome this issue and sign minutes.
