The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is due to open its doors to Macedonia on Wednesday by signing a protocol of accession with Macedonia after resolving a decades-old dispute with Greece, a NATO member.
The move would allow Macedonia to participate in NATO meetings as an observer until all allies have ratified the accession protocol. In this case, Macedonia will become the 30th member of NATO.
Macedonia agreed last year, after lengthy negotiations, to change its name to Northern Macedonia, in order to distinguish it from an ancient Greek territory called the territory of Macedonia.
The dispute dates back to the 1991 break-up of the former Yugoslavia, and since then, Athens has blocked Skopje´s membership of NATO and the European Union.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg and Macedonia´s Foreign Minister Nikola Dimitrov will attend today´s ceremony, as well as representatives of the 29 NATO member states.
Greece is expected to be the first country to ratify the Macedonia accession protocol, a move expected to be implemented in the coming days, according to information from Athens.
After that, Macedonia will officially and definitively change its name to Northern Macedonia.
