During his visit to Bulgaria, European Council President Antonio Costa andorsed a key request from Macedonia – that reasonable guarantees are given to Macedonia that Bulgaria will not issue endless demands.

It is reasonable that we guarantee to Macedonia that we won’t ask her to do anything more after it does what we expect and want from her, Costa said during a press conference with Bulgarian Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov.

Bulgaria demands that Macedonia amends its Constitution and includes the Bulgarian minority in the Preamble, but at the same time is sending clear signals that many more nationalist requests will follow after this concession is made. In response, Macedonia offers to make the change, but at the end of its EU accession process, to make sure that Bulgaria does not delay it with new demands.

Costa and Zhelyazkov reiterated the call on Macedonia to amend the Constitution, which EU officials have made many times in the past. But the call for guarantees for Macedonia is a new one. An attempt to adopt a resolution in the European Parliament that would have reiterated the value of the Macedonian national identity and language was shot down by Bulgarian representatives, which further soured relations between the two countries.