MACEDONIAN PM: CURRENT NIMETZ PROPOSAL WILL NOT

C O N F I D E N T I A L USNATO 000372 NOFORN SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/13/2018 TAGS: PREL MARR NATO MK SUBJECT: MACEDONIAN PM: CURRENT NIMETZ PROPOSAL WILL NOT PASS PUBLIC SCRUTINY Classified By: Ambassador Kurt Volker for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) ¶1. (C/NF) Summary: Macedonian Prime Minister Gruevski told Ambassador Volker on October 15 that he has problems accepting the current Nimetz ideas for solving the name issue as a basis for negotiation. He said the Nimetz proposal would only improve marginally during a negotiation process, and not enough to succeed in a national referendum. Ambassador Volker cautioned that European sympathy for Macedonia would wane if Macedonia, rather than Greece, began to appear to be the obstacle to progress, and warned that accession to NATO would become harder if the name issue is not solved soon. End Summary. ¶2. (C/NF) Macedonian Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski visited NATO October 15 to discuss Macedonia's Euro-Atlantic aspirations with Ambassador Volker. Gruevski highlighted Macedonia's ongoing reforms, and thanked the United States for its support for Macedonian membership in NATO. He said that Greek opposition to Macedonian progress had hardened since the Bucharest Summit. Gruevski illustrated this with the example that the Slovenian Presidency of the European Union in June 2008 had briefed him that Greece had torpedoed otherwise unanimous EU consensus on accession talks for Macedonia. ¶3. (C/NF) Turning to the Nimetz talks, Gruevski said that public and commentator opinion on the latest Nimetz proposal had been very negative, and he felt that he may have to reject this proposal as a basis for negotiation. Gruevski said the current Nimetz proposal could not be the basis for negotiation as it would only improve marginally during a negotiation process. Any outcome that started with the current proposal would not evolve enough in the right direction to survive a national referendum in Macedonia. Gruevski also said he needed to find an additional reason to pitch a name solution to the Macedonian people, as future NATO and EU membership would not convince the public to back a change in the name of the country. ¶4. (C/NF) Ambassador Volker acknowledged the challenges in appealing to the electorate, but cautioned that the post-Bucharest summit good feeling for Macedonia would wane if Macedonia, rather than Greece, began to appear to be the obstacle to progress. Volker said that the essence of Macedonian identity would never change, regardless of a negotiation, and reminded Gruevski that Americans and Europeans would always think of Macedonians as Macedonians independent of any piece of paper on the name issue. He thought that Macedonia stood at a strategic crossroads and that the best future for Macedonia lay inside NATO and the EU, rather than outside. The Ambassador advised Gruevski to find an answer to Nimetz that was not "no," and suggested he look at alternatives that would outline which parts of the proposal could be acceptable to the Macedonian side. Such an approach could continue to pressure the Greeks, and reduce the risks of Macedonia being portrayed as the reason a deal has not been reached. If Macedonia was seen as a reasonable actor, then we could approach some EU countries to help urge the Greeks to allow Macedonian accession both to NATO and the EU. Finally, Volker cautioned that it would become harder to integrate Macedonia into NATO if the issue dragged on past NATO's December 2-3 Foreign Ministerial. Ratification would not be possible in some countries in less than the four months remaining before the Strasbourg-Kehl summit, and Macedonia would miss the current round of enlargement. Future questions about Macedonia's preparedness could be raised, and it was in Macedonia's interest to get in now. ¶5. (C/NF) Gruevski thanked Ambassador Volker and promised to consider his views. He pledged to do his best to win NATO and EU membership. He then raised an issue of the alleged detention by Greek police of Macedonian journalists who had been covering protests by ethnic Macedonians in Greece. The Ambassador cautioned that it would be best to keep a calm public demeanor over the incident and to let the Greeks be embarrassed by their own action, and use this as an example of why these ethnic issues should be put in the past. REID