Macedonian parliamentarians on Friday approved an amendment to the Constitution, which provides for the change of the name of the country from the Republic of Macedonia to the Republic of Northern Macedonia.
The situation around the name of this former Yugoslav Republic prevented the rapprochement of Macedonia with the EU and NATO, since Greece, one of the regions of which is also called Macedonia, opposed the name of the Republic of Macedonia. Because of this, after the collapse of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Macedonia was accepted into the UN under the name of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, and on the Greek maps it was called Skopje – after the capital of the country Skopje.