The commitment of the Balkan countries for membership in the EU and NATO is a process and there is no turning back. Our citizens should live in peace and harmony and act and work according to the rights and regulations, in the spirit of European standards and strive towards a prosperous future. This was the joint message of the presidents Dr. Gjorge Ivanov and Bamir Topi, at today’s press conference during the official visit of the Albanian President to the Republic of Macedonia.

Both presidents said that in both societies there is no room for acts that may have adverse affect to the stability of the region. At the meeting they discussed the murder of five people near Smiljkovci Lake, and offered condolences to the families of the victims.

Macedonian President Ivanov stressed that competent institutions act responsibly and the same attitude is expected from other entities in society.

”I also discussed this issue with President Topi. Readiness is expressed for mutual cooperation among the institutions and agencies in detecting possible perpetrators of this monstrous act as soon as. It is in everyone’s interest to detect perpetrators, because if they had the courage to do such an act here, they could perform similar act elsewhere. It is obvious that it is not in someone’s interest the region to progress and the situation to be improved. We expect the job to be done by the competent institutions and the public not to succumb to speculations and various imputations typical in such moments”, President Ivanov said.

Every destabilizing or criminal act should be treated as such and be subject to all institutional inquiries within the legal institutions. I am against violence by anyone against anyone and right from here we are sending a joint message to people to live in peace”, Albanian President Topi said, adding that every nationalist or ultranationalist reflex or any climate of prejudice would be detrimental to the relations between Macedonians and Albanians in Macedonia and the general relations in the region.

Albanian President Topi urged media not to succumb to speculations and to emit instead messages of coexistence and understanding.

"As media representatives, you should be sending messages of coexistence in a common space where the interest of the country to join Euro-Atlantic structures is interests of every citizen and isolate all malicious messages with a nationalistic background", President Topi said.

President Ivanov pledged for an open and frank dialogue on any outstanding issue: "We have had enough divisions here, enough prejudice, we have had enough of mutual gossip and work for someone else's purposes", President Ivanov said.

Presidents Topi and Ivanov agreed that the future of both countries is in the Euro-Atlantic structures. In that context, President Topi expressed strong support for the future membership of Macedonia in NATO. Both presidents expressed their commitment to intensify economic cooperation between both countries, by focusing on infrastructure projects and Corridor 8.