Explanation: Before North Macedonia was North Macedonia, it was just Macedonia. This upset Greece so much that they spent several decades cockblocking Macedonia from the EU and NATO purely over the matter of the name of Macedonia belonging to Greece, in Greece’s strange opinion.

We were in Skopje the day after they changed the name from the placeholder FYROM to North Macedonia. Going to the national museum that the former government (the one that made all the “historical” monuments and buildings) had created, with all the propaganda extolling their right to control ‘greater Macedonia’ (including Thessaloniki), I think it’s naive to view this as a petty naming dispute.

I think ‘North Macedonia’ was a good compromise, even if it made the Golden Dawn cry (generally I’m for anything that makes them cry, actually). Of course, I know a lot of non-Nazi Greeks that also were against them using the name, but I thought their arguments were generally of a nationalistic nature (Macedonia is Greece!).

North Macedonia is so fetch.

I was in Skopje for a wedding last year, very interesting country. Felt very Balkans to me, minus of course the “Greek” statues.

It’s funny to think about this useless arguments of pride between nations, but the effect is very much serious. It’s a poor country, which probably would be very different as an EU member,