Bulgaria’s Deputy Premier and Minister of Foreign Affairs Ekaterina Zaharieva discussed North Macedonia’s EU perspective with her counterpart Nikola Dimitrov. Ministers Zaharieva and Dimitrov met in Helsinki at the informal meeting of the EU Foreign Affairs and the Foreign Ministers of six countries from the Western Balkans. Bulgaria has been consistently supporting the EU and North-Atlantic integration of North Macedonia and believes that the negotiations on North Macedonia’s accession to the EU should begin, Minister Zaharieva said. Earlier, Ekaterina Zaharieva met with Greece’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Nikos Dendias. The Bulgaria-Greece bilateral relations are excellent, Ministers Zaharieva and Dendias pointed out and added that the economic efficiency between the Bulgarian and the Greek companies is high. In 2018 trade between Bulgaria and Greece increased with 7.8% as compared to 2017 and amounted to EUR 3.3 billion. Greece is the fifth biggest importer of Bulgarian goods after Germany, Italy, Romania and Turkey.