New round of name talks to take place in New York on January 17


A new round for settling Skopje-Athens name dispute will take place in New York on January 17, Macedonia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs told MIA on Tuesday.

The United Nations mediator in the Macedonia-Greece name negotiations, Matthew Nimetz, is scheduled to meet the countries’ representatives, Vasko Naumovski and Ademantios Vassilakis respectively.

The last round of UN-mediated talks with the countries’ representatives was held on 11-12 December  2017 in Brussels after a three-year stalemate.

Nimetz announced then that the talks would be intensified in the next period with new meetings in New York, in January, February and March.

The fresh round of talks comes in a period of intensified activities and a climate of optimism in Skopje, Athens, Brussels and Washington for final settlement of the long-standing name row.

For the last few days the Prime Ministers of Macedonia and Greece, Zoran Zaev and Alexis Tsipras respectively, pointed out that possibilities were in place for finding a solution to  the name dispute in the first half of 2018.