Political scientist: The protests in Macedonia – another episode in the battle between Russia and the West – 2024-09-03 14:55:15

/ world today news/ The anti-government campaign in Macedonia is developing according to the classic scenario of “non-violent protest”, well understood by the West, and directed against the politicians who support the “Turkish Stream” project, says Serj Trifkovic. /Russian. ez./

The series of anti-government protests that have engulfed Macedonia are caused by persistent attempts by the West to facilitate a change of political regime in the Balkan state, political scientist and editor-in-chief of the Chronicles publication Srdja Trifkovic said in an interview with RT.

“Everything is happening according to the classic scenario of regime change, developed by Gene Sharp (a political scientist, the author of the theory of non-violent political struggle – editor’s note) many years ago. It is unlikely that this tactic will work again, this time in Macedonia, since we are talking only about thousands, not tens of thousands of protesters,” the expert believes.

In his opinion, the leader of the Macedonian Socialists, Zoran Zaev, has no reason to expect that the country’s Prime Minister, Nikola Gruevski, will “pack his bags” and leave – Zaev himself is under pressure from both the West, which has provided the opposition with information about the allegedly illegal actions of government officials, and Albanian terrorists, so the opposition leader’s freedom of maneuver is severely limited.

“I don’t think that everything will end in a day or two with another resignation of the president,” the political scientist believes.

Washington and Brussels have had their finger on the pulse of this crisis since its inception, Trifkovic is certain. The geopolitical basis for the West’s intervention in Macedonia’s domestic political landscape was Prime Minister Gruevski’s desire to consider the possibility of laying part of the Turkish Stream gas pipeline through the territory of the Balkan state.

Under similar pressure from the US and the EU, Bulgaria was forced to say “no” to the Russian project to transit gas to Europe through the Balkans. Macedonia was next in line, the expert believes. As soon as Nikola Gruevski’s intentions became known, he became a “target” and a “corrupt nationalist” for the West.

“We are seeing a stunning spectacle with the appearance of the EU ambassador in Skopje among the crowd of protesters. It is obvious that the message for regime change is coming from Brussels and Washington, and the roots of the protest go back to the actions of Albanian terrorists in Kumanovo on May 9. I think we are witnessing another episode in the long geopolitical struggle between the US and its accommodating European friends on one side and Russia on the other.”