NEWS OF THE DAY: Germany for a speedy start of EU negotiations
Following the positive assessments of the EC on North Macedonia and Albania, Germany is committed to a speedy start of EU membership negotiations with both countries,” stated German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas.
– The two countries have made progress on key reform areas, especially on strengthening the judiciary system and the fight against corruption. We share the positive assessment of the EC. That is why we support a swift start of EU membership negotiations. The negotiations are the best tool that can be given to Albania and North Macedonia and the best possible support for further progress, assessed Maas.
France sees the Report of the European Commission and the enlargement methodology optimistically, as an encouraging basis for a decision to be made for starting EU negotiations with North Macedonia, said French Ambassador Cristian Thimonier at today’s meeting with Prime Minister Oliver Spasovski.
Dutch MPs of the Committee on European Affairs on March 5 will discuss the issue of enlargement with the Western Balkans, informed the Dutch Parliament. It is a matter of a “procedural meeting” of the Parliamentary Committee on European Affairs at which MPs will be “deciding on the manner of treating” various documents, including also “government notes” on EU enlargement and the Western Balkans, but also the EU budget, the working programme of the European Commission, Brexit and the Conference on the Future of Europe.
Progress in key reform areas has been concluded in the Report of the European Commission on the fulfilment of the conditions for accession negotiations, which is the basis on which the EU member stated are to decide this month whether they will approve their start. The EC Report is focused on the judicial reforms, high corruption trials, including also the case with the SPO, security reforms and reforms in the public administration.
The document concludes that given the “significant progress and fulfilment of the conditions unanimously set by the Council in June 2019, the Commission recommended in its enlargement package in 2019 that the Council should start negotiations with North Macedonia.
FLASH: Where is the money coming from?
Xhabir Deralla: VMRO-DPMNE has been leading an extensive and expensive advertising for a long time. Having in consideration the debts in millions of euros, the frozen assets and unsettled (millions worth) notices of previous election processes, the question remains – where is the money coming from?
POLITICALLY OK CORRAL: Facebook decisions for political points
SDSM President Zoran Zaev assessed the renaming of two schools in the Municipality of Cair as an unlawfully conducted procedure, which the Central Registry should correct immediately, as there is no decision of the Council of the Municipality of Cair. Minister of Education Arber Ademi informed about the change on his Facebook profile.
STATEMENT OF THE DAY: Sekerinska: Fake news should not be spread about the migrant crisis, this is not the way to protect the state
The situation at the southern border is stable, we will act preventively and according to all possible scenarios, said today Minister of Defence Radmila Sekerinska at the “Ilinden” barracks, where she informed that this weekend, preparations had started for increasing the presence of the police and army at the border as a result of the events at the Turkey-Greece border with the migrants.
-Currently, there is no greater pressure at our border than previously, the main pressure is at the Greece-Turkey border. The fact is that it caused a certain withdrawal of the Greek forces to focus on the Turkish border and this caused migrants who were already in Greece to move towards the north of the European Union, said Sekerinska.
The Minister urged for fake news not to be spread and not to create misinformation regardless of the reason what agenda is behind it.
NOT LESS IMPORTANT:
Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland, Jacek Czaputowicz, the Republic of Latvia-Edgars Rinkevics, the Republic of Lithuania, Linas Linkevičius and Deputy Minister of European Affairs of Estonia, Mart Volmer, in the capacity of representatives of the group of EU member states “Friends of Enlargement”, today and tomorrow are paying a visit to the Republic of North Macedonia, ahead of the discussions of the EU General Affairs Council in regards to the decision for the start of the EU accession negotiations.
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The OSCE – ODIHR Mission will be observing the elections on April 12, with 250 short-term observers. Tana de Zulueta, Head of Mission, said that the elections will also be observed by a delegation of the European Parliament.
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SDSM leader Zoran Zaev hopes that together with the coalition parties they will win at the early parliamentary elections with more than 61 MPs. However, this, says Zaev, does not mean that they are not open for a post-election coalition, given that a stable majority is needed in order to work on the fulfilment of all reform processes and on the development of the economy in order to improve the lives of the citizens.
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The patient who has coronavirus and is at the Infectious Disease Clinic is feeling better and for the third and fourth day in a row has no fever. Slowly she is entering a more stable phase of the disease. There are no new patients that are being tested for the coronavirus at the moment, stated today Minister of Health Venko Filipce, who together with Prime Minister Oliver Spasovski visited the border crossing of Tabanovce with the purpose to check the system for prevention of coronavirus.
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Red Cross General Secretary Sait Saiti today stated that they are prepared in case of a wave of migrants.
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SDSM President Zoran Zaev assessed the renaming of two schools in the Municipality of Cair as an unlawfully conducted procedure, which the Central Registry should correct immediately, as there is no decision of the Council of the Municipality of Cair for which Minister of Education Arber Ademi informed on his Facebook profile.
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Since the start of the public inspection of the Voters Register on February 26 and until March 1, ahead of the early parliamentary elections on April 12, 2.613 citizens have checked their data in the regional offices of the State Election Commission (SEC).
CIVIL ACTIVITIES
CIVIL panel discussion on hate speech
CIVIL is organizing a panel discussion titled “Hate speech: Situations and solutions” on Thursday, March 5, at Hotel City Park (near the Municipality of Center), starting at 12.30 pm. Snezana Trpevska, Institute RESIS, expert on media and media law, Petrit Saracini, activist, journalist and media expert and Kocho Andonovski, Program Director of LGBTI Support Center will be speaking about the situation, but also of the possible solutions to the problems related to the destructive potential that hate speech carries. Xhabir Deralla, President of CIVIL, will be moderator of the panel discussion.
FREE ZONE
“Imagine a different pre-election strategy: instead of spreading hysteria and conspiracy theories, for the opposition and its media arsenal to make themselves politically available for constructive and well-intentioned assistance in the country’s dealing with this potential crisis…”, writes Saso Ordanoski in The propaganda “munition” and the migrants. Macedonia can’t be an “excellent student”, points Dzevdet Hajredini: Ambassador of FR of Germany, Mr. Thomas Gerberich, in an interview once stated: “If you ask the people who are standing here in front of the door for a working visa, if they would stay in the country if there were better conditions, better hospitals for their children, an education system, if they felt safer, if there were an independent judiciary, fight against corruption, sure they would stay. Salaries play a role, but in a developed democratic society, salaries can also increase”.
How and why is the judge-millionaire part of the Anti-Western campaign? Is the question to which Xhabir Deralla gave his own answer. The online comment against the EU by the judge-millionaire was still “evaporating”, while the well-known plethora of media outlets immediately published his comment and attacked the algorithms on the internet space. These are the same media outlets for which we now find out that in 2018 they had received millions for a campaign against the Macedonian strategic interests and NATO membership” – writes Deralla.
Angela Petrovska
