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Southeast Europe
October 26, 2018 www.intellinews.com I Page 13
show that she is standing behind her decision that there is a need for constitutional changes and that the people should not be divided into patriots and traitors.
The governing Social Democrats reacted in a statement saying that the anti-Western leadership of VMRO, led by Mickoski, remains isolated in its intentions to keep Macedonia away from the EU and Nato.
“Mickoski and the anti-Western leadership have been defeated by their own party, by the majority of citizens, and by MPs who voted for the future in the EU and Nato by accepting constitutional changes,” the SDSM said in the statement.
The SDSM’s general secretary Aleksandar Kira- covski urged other opposition MPs to support the process and to vote yes in the next stages of constitutional changes.
Russia weighs in
Meanwhile on October 23, the Russian foreign ministry accused the Macedonian government of using “threats and bribery” to launch the process of constitutional changes in the parliament. Russia is openly against Macedonia's accession to Nato.
“Eight votes, which were not enough to get a qual- ified majority, were secured by blackmail, threats and bribery of opposition deputies,” the Russian ministry said in the statement on October 22.
The ministry claimed that three opposition MPs were released from arrest, two who had been detained by special prosecutors were promised freedom, while the others were offered money in exchange for a yes vote.
“The parliamentarians were locked in offices, their mobile phones were seized. The US ambas- sador was in the parliament until the end of the parliament session, which leaves no doubt who orchestrated this process,” the ministry said.
According to the Russian ministry, the solution of the Macedonian-Greek dispute should be based on legal foundations and on the broad support
of the people.
In the next stage of the process of implementing the name deal with Greece, the government will send the constitutional amendments to the parlia- ment on October 26 for which they need a simple majority. The process may last one month.
Then the amendments should be finally approved in the parliament with a two-thirds majority,
a process expected to be completed by the end
of January.
However, the process is not expected to run smoothly as some small parties who oppose the deal have announced protests. It is not clear how deeply divided VMRO will act during the next stages of the deal implementation.
Crown prince’s line that Saudis and Turks won’t be divided over Khashoggi affair falls flat
bne IntelliNews
The Khashoggi plot thickened on October 24 as
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman told a business forum in Riyadh: “A lot of people are trying to seize this painful situation to create
a rift between Saudi Arabia and Turkey. And I want
to send them a message: you will never be able to do that.”
The remark will have struck a bum note with any analyst worth his salt on relations between the Sau-