US appeals to Greece, Macedonia for NATO breakthrough
WASHINGTON (AFP) — The US government Tuesday urged Greece and Macedonia to resolve a name dispute that risks shutting the Balkan state out of NATO.
Macedonia should be invited to join the military alliance along with Croatia and Albania at a NATO summit next month, said Daniel Fried, the assistant secretary of state for European affairs.
Along with Kosovo's independence, the admission of the three states "helps us take the Balkans into the 21st century," he told a hearing of the Senate's foreign relations committee.
But Greece is threatening to veto Macedonia's admission as it lays claim to the country's name for a province of its own. For now, the state is known in diplomatic circles as the "Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia."
"The administration is urging both parties to work together and with UN negotiator Matthew Nimetz, to come to a conclusion before Bucharest," Fried said in reference to the April 2-4 summit in the Romanian capital.
Greece earlier Tuesday urged Skopje to accept one of five names proposed by Nimetz -- Constitutional Republic of Macedonia, Democratic Republic of Macedonia, Independent Republic of Macedonia, New Republic of Macedonia, and Republic of Upper Macedonia.
The Senate committee's Democratic chairman, Joseph Biden, urged both sides to reach a "reasonable compromise" on the name dispute and stressed that any delay to Macedonia's admission should not penalize Albania or Croatia.
Biden also urged NATO to admit the former Soviet republics of Georgia and Ukraine to its Membership Action Plan, a precursor to admission, despite Russian anger and strong public discontent in Ukraine.
