The European Union will start the screening process for Macedonia’s pre-accession negotiations next week, European Commissioner Johannes Hahn and Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev said in Skopje on Tuesday.

“We will have an important meeting in Brussels next week to mark the start of the screening process, that is the start of preparations for negotiations. I think we are at the start of an important process,” Hahn told a news conference with Zaev.  

Zaev said that his government had already begun preparations for the process.

“We are already implementing important reforms and, as of June 2019, we will have twice as many concrete reform steps in key areas such as the rule of law, fight against corruption, reform of the public administration and intelligence services,” he said. 

According to the Macedonian prime minister, the next important step towards the EU is the referendum on the change of the name of the former Yugoslav republic which has been agreed with Greece as a condition to start integration into the EU.

Zaev told the AFP on Monday that rejecting the new name at a referendum could result in instability and isolation.

The agreement, signed by Zaev and his Greek counterpart Alexis Tsipras, could end decades of a dispute over the name Macedonia.

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