Five years of Macedonia’s membership in NATO

Macedonia today marks five years since NATO membership after becoming the 30th member of the Alliance today. Thus, the country realized one of its strategic goals that was set in the resolution adopted by the Parliament in 1993.

On the occasion of the fifth anniversary today, a meeting of Foreign Minister and Foreign Minister Timco Mucunski will be held at the Skopje MPs with the ambassadors of the Member States and Partners of the Alliance. According to the agenda, Minister Mucunski will address the start of the event, followed by a closed discussion.

The commitment to Euro -Atlantic integration dates back to 1993, when the Parliament adopted a resolution that defined the state’s foreign political priorities, namely NATO and EU membership.

On November 15, 1995, the state signed the Framework Document for Access to the « Partnership for Peace » program, and on June 14, 1996, a link office opened. In April 1999, at the NATO Summit in Washington, the Republic of Macedonia acquired the status of candidate country for membership in the Alliance, after which the preparation and realization of the Membership Action Plan began.

As part of the declarations of the next NATO summits (Lisbon 2010, Chicago 2012, Wales 2014 and Warsaw 2016), the Bucharest formulation was repeated that the Alliance would invite NATO membership immediately after reaching a mutually acceptable name solution within the UN.

At the NATO Summit in Brussels, July 11-12, 2018, the North Atlantic Council, at a meeting of heads of state and government, decided to invite Macedonia to start accession talks on membership in the Alliance.

On August 1, 2018, then NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg sent a letter to then Foreign Minister Nikola Dimitrov, along with a plan to implement the NATO accession process.

On October 18 and 19, 2018, at a meeting held at the NATO headquarters in Brussels, the country successfully completed accession talks on membership. On January 21, 2019, the Foreign Minister sent a letter to the NATO Secretary -General in which the country’s readiness and ability to accept and respect the obligations and commitments for NATO membership, contained in the Washington Agreement and the 1995 NATO Enlargement Study, as well as NATO’s accession.

On February 6, 2019, at the NATO headquarters in Brussels, representatives of the 29 member states of the Alliance in the presence of the then NATO Secretary General and the former foreign minister signed the accession protocol for membership.

After the ceremony in Brussels, the procedure for ratification of the accession protocol by all 29 member states of the Alliance began. The procedure for ratification of the accession protocol was finalized on March 19, 2020, when the Ambassador of the Kingdom of Spain to Washington handed over the Washington Treaty Ratification Instrument, thus completing the third and final phase of the accession process.

In order to smoothly conduct the country’s integration process into NATO, the Parliament unanimously ratified the North Atlantic Agreement, after which, on March 20, 2020, it was followed by the signing of the instrument for ratification of the accession protocol for NATO membership by the President of the State.

On March 27, 2020, through the Macedonian Embassy in Washington, the State Department in the United States deposited an instrument for accession to the North Atlantic Agreement, making the country officially became the thirtieth member of the Alliance.