Sun, Nov 22 2009

Macedonia, US sign declaration on strategic partnership

Fri, May 09 2008 13:25 CET bySpasena Baramova 212 Views

On May 7 2008, Macedonia and the US inked a declaration on strategic partnership, world news agencies reported.

The agreement expressed the two countries' intention to develop their cooperation in the fields of security, economy and culture, as well as to extend their military ties.

The declaration is widely seen as an US move trying to make up for Macedonia not getting invited to join Nato at the bloc's April 2008 summit in Bucharest. Back then, Greece vetoed the issuing of an invitation to Macedonia because of the unsettled name dispute between the two Balkan countries.

Since Macedonia broke away from former Yugoslavia in 1991, it has insisted that it be recognised under its constitutional name, Republic of Macedonia. Macedonia, however, is also the name of Greece's northern province and according to Athens having a bordering state use it as its official name is indicative of its territorial claims over Greece. Therefore, the Greeks have been requesting a name change from their neighbours for 17 years now.

"The United States strongly support the accession of Macedonia into Nato, as soon as the name dispute can be reconciled [...] We hope that will happen very, very soon, because Macedonia deserves to be a member of Nato. Macedonia will enhance Nato's strength, prosperity and democracy," US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice said at the signing ceremony, as quoted by Reuters.

On Macedonia's behalf, the declaration was signed by foreign minister Antonio Milososki.

Write comment

Name:Comment:

Generate new code
Send your comment

More in this category

White tigress slaughtered by lions

The white tigress is a rare animal resulting from a special recessive gene

Poland, Lithuania, Ukraine to form military brigade

The agreement was signed in Brussels earlier this week but it's still a long way off before the Polish-Lithuanian-Ukrainian brigade can be formalized as an international agreement.

Flu slows down Kyiv

Affected by quarantine and panic, life in Kyiv has been subdued in the past few weeks.

Poll: Number of Russians worrying about A(H1N1) growing

The number of Russians worrying about contracting the A(H1N1) flu virus grew to 70 per cent in November from 57 per cent in September.

Riots break out in central Athens on 36th anniversary of the Polytechnic massacre

The Polytechnic University or Politechniu in Greek, was the scene of a massacre in 1973, when Greek army tanks broke into the University and shot students indiscriminately, killing dozens of youths.

© 2000-2009, Sofia Echo Media Ltd.

Web Design by RIZN

Sofia Echo Media is part of the Economedia Group.
The news and information content on this website is provided by our editorial team and is copyrighted. Any unauthorised reproduction or use of it is strictly forbidden. Reproduction of this website's content is permitted only with prior written permission from the Editor-in-Chief, should be propertly acredited and provide an active link back to our site. Comments posted by the website's visitors are independent of the editorial materials and do not represent the views of sofiaecho.com. Sofia Echo Media cannot be held responsible for the statements contained in visitor comments. The percentаge change in the shares' prices are based on the price of the last transaction of the current session compared to the price of the last transaction of the previous session. Bulgarian Stock Exchange data is not real-time, but updated every 15 minutes, and should not be used as a basis for decisions about buying or selling stock options.