Nikola Gruevski, the controversial PM of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), continued his revisionist and largely uneducated view of the region’s history, saying that “Macedonia’ united all ‘Macedonians” throughout the centuries. During a speech at Skopje’s National Theatre, on the occasion of the 24th anniversary of the landlocked state’s independence from a collapsing Yugoslavia, the 45-year-old nationalist leader said the first priority of his neophyte Balkan nation was to enter NATO.

He reminded that this was stalled due to the name dispute with Greece. Referring to the … continuity of FYROM, Gruevski reached back to the ancient Kingdom of Macedon, in an attempt to present his country as the historical heir of ancient … Μακεδονία, only two and a half millennia later.