Macedonia's Accession Hopes Rise as EU Officials Visit

Johannes Hahn is expected to arrive in Skopje on Wednesday, just one day after the European Commission publishes its report on the country's progress, while Federica Mogherini will be in Macedonia on Thursday.

The focus of talks with top Macedonian officials is expected to be the pace of EU-sought reforms, as well as the ongoing efforts to resolve the long-running bilateral name dispute between Macedonia and Greece.

Mogherini and Hahn will be greeted with positive news when it comes to the reform effort.

After a four-month boycott, the main opposition right-wing VMRO DPMNE party returned to parliament last week and started participating in the debate about a batch of EU-sought reform bills.

Since the change in power in May last year, the Social Democrat-led government has been working hard to bring in a long overdue set of reforms that aim to democratise Macedonia's key institutions in areas like the judiciary, the secret services and the public administration.

But for some key reform laws, like the ones aiming to remove the political grip on judiciary and secret services, and to boost protection of witnesses in high-level corruption cases, the government needed a two-thirds majority in parliament which was possible only with the help of the opposition.

These three bills passed last week after the opposition returned to parliament and voted in favour of them.

This was preceded by tough talks between the government and the opposition, during which many of the opposition amendments were accepted as a precondition for its return to parliament.

The opposition launched its parliamentary y boycott in November, when six of its MP's were apprehended over their alleged role in last April's mob...