On Wednesday, North Macedonia saw a significant political shift to the nationalist right-wing amidst historic losses for the governing SDSM in presidential and parliamentary contests.
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00:00 A historic moment for North Macedonia as it elected its first female president Gordana
00:05 Seljanovska-Defkova this week. She was backed by the right-wing VMRO-DPMNE party and won
00:13 with nearly 65% of the vote. But the win could spell danger for the Balkan countries EU accession
00:19 talks.
00:20 In terms of the European integration, the main thing, the constitutional changes, that
00:25 remains to be seen how and whether VMRO will agree to adopt them. There is a consensus
00:32 from what we hear from the Albanian parties overall that they will not go into a coalition
00:36 with some of them, will not vote for them. So we might expect here to see some shifts.
00:42 Despite being the Western Balkan region's early frontrunner to join the EU, North Macedonia
00:47 has encountered bumps on its road to membership. A Greek veto over the country's name, followed
00:53 by a block by Bulgaria over history and language claims, halted negotiations for decades.
00:59 (whooshing)