It’s highly unusual and irregular for a president of a NATO member state to urge special services to take measures regarding alleged violations of the rights of nationals living in another NATO member state, President Pendarovski has said following Bulgarian President Rumen Radev’s reaction concerning Macedonian-Bulgarian relations.
The Bulgarian President’s reaction, Pendarovski’s Office said in a press release on Tuesday, violates a basic principle in international politics, that is the principle of non-interference in the domestic affairs of other countries.
Moreover, it stressed that President Pendarovski has not been briefed by relevant intuitions on any violations of the human rights and freedoms of Macedonian citizens, based on their ethnicity.
“North Macedonia, as an EU candidate country, has for years been monitored by Brussels. No such cases were registered in the country’s latest progress report either,” the press release read.
Bulgarian President Rumen Radev met Monday with chiefs of the country’s special services, urging them to undertake timely measures for adequate protection of the rights of nationals outside of Bulgaria, who are exposed to attacks only because of their national self-determination, MIA reported from Sofia.
The meeting, also attended by Vice President Iliana Iotova, came after the President’s Office received a letter from culture center Ivan Mihaylov-Bitola and other citizens of North Macedonia declaring themselves as Bulgarians, and ‘the frequent occurrences of their rights’ violations only because they declare themselves as ethnic Bulgarians”.
