Bulgarians from RSM to Várhelyi: Lack of dialogue with the authorities in Skopje, the pressure is daily

NGO’s of the Macedonian Bulgarians in the RNM requested a meeting with Olivér Várhelyi, EU Commissioner for Neighbourhood and Enlargement, due to the institutional hatred and systematic discrimination against them, a BGNES reported.

In their letter, they stress that there is no willingness for dialogue with them on the said of the local and central authorities in their homeland.

BGNES news agency published the full text of the letter by Bulgarians in RSM.

Dear Mr. Commissioner,

Please allow us to introduce ourselves!

We are NGOs representatives of the openly identified as such Bulgarian community in RNM.

Encouraged by your recent statement and willingness to receive us, we are addressing you with the intention and hope that such a meeting will take place as soon as possible, of course based on your availability. The daily stigmatization of our Bulgarian community and the inability to establish a dialogue with local and national authorities creates challenges for our community that often exceed our individual and collective capabilities.

We sincerely hope that the dialogue with you will contribute to reducing the daily pressure on us - the citizens of RNM who are not afried despite the discrimination and hate speech risk to openly stand to our Macedoinan Bulgarian legacy and identity.

Dear Mr. Commissioner, thank you very much in advance for your willingness to understand our situation and meet with us. We are looking forward to recieve your proposal for a meeting with you.

Sincerely,

Petar Kolev – Macedonian-Bulgarian Friendship Association

Ljupcho Georgievski - Cultural Center Ivan Mihailov-Bitola

Dobre Mitrev - Macedonian-Bulgarian friendship – Skopje

Ljupcho Kurtelov - Balkan horizons-Ohrid

Vladimir Perev - Corridor 8- Skopje

Tome Blazevski - Tsar Boris III - Ohrid

Jovan Nikolov - Association Delo-Skopje

Elizabeta Velichkova - Tribune - Prilep

Marinela Petreska - Association for "Macedonian-Bulgarian Friendship" Bitola

Vlado Trenevski - Interaction-Ohrid

Stole Velkov - Unity Foundation – Kochani. /BGNES