North Macedonia census

Athens on Thursday issued an official response to recent statements by the prime minister of North Macedonia, Hristijan Mickoski, who indicated that Skopje does not consider the name dispute with Greece as resolved.

Mickoski, Greece's Foreign Ministry said, is "attempting to bring back to the fore an issue that has been resolved, as we know, finally and irrevocably." 

North Macedonian Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski declared that citizens of the Republic of North Macedonia will discard their Bulgarian passports as soon as the country joins the European Union.

North Macedonia's new prime minister Hristijan Mickoski started his first day in office Monday following a late-night parliamentary vote, likely setting the country on a collision course with EU neighbours Greece and Bulgaria.

On the Brink

Bulgarian Prime Minister Kiril Petkov arrives for the European Council Summit in Brussels, Belgium, 24 March 2022.-EFE/JULIEN WARNAND

More than 508,000 residents of North Macedonia, more than a quarter of the 1.8 million population, have either not received any formal education, or started but did not finish high school, data on education and literacy from the census conducted last year show.