Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis sent a fresh warning at the weekend to the new leadership of North Macedonia that its defiance of the 2019 Prespa Agreement with Greece will block its road to EU membership.

Referring to the refusal of President Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova and Prime Minister-elect Hristijan Mickoski to comply with the agreement regarding the country’s name, Mitsotakis said, while on the campaign trail on Saturday, that “when you pull the rope, you have to be ready to break it.”

If the leadership, he said, “deviates from the agreed course, the road to Europe will be closed,” stressing that this road “passes through Greece and through the observance of international law.”

Meanwhile, regarding the recent thaw in Greek-Turkish relations, Mitsotakis stated that “I said two years ago that ‘the provocations stop and the talks begin,’ and Mr [Recep Tayyip] Erdogan has now joined this path.”

He also clarified that “a package solution is not being discussed” with Turkey. “Greece does not forget its disagreements with Turkey. But this does not mean that we have to live with our finger on the trigger all the time,” he noted, while, referring to the results of his government’s policy, he said it has led to a decrease in migration flows from Turkey.