SKOPJE — Italy’s foreign minister Tuesday voiced strong support for Western Balkan countries’ European Union accession bids, saying that otherwise the region could swing towards Russia or China.

Speaking during a visit to North Macedonia, Antonio Tajani said the bloc should “lend a hand to those peoples who want to be with us Europeans.”

“If we don’t do that, there will be someone else who wants to replace us, I mean Russia, China and other parts of the world, I mean Turkey,” Tajani said.

He spoke during a press conference with his North Macedonian counterpart Timcho Mutsunski in the capital Skopje.

Tajani said Italy is “working and will work for North Macedonia to be an effective member of the European Union as soon as possible.”

North Macedonia and neighboring Albania have been candidates to join the EU since 2005. They launched membership negotiations with the block in 2022, in a process expected to take years.

The other Western Balkan countries seeking to join the EU are Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Kosovo.

Disputes with neighboring EU members have held up accession talks for North Macedonia. A decades-long spat with Greece over the use of the name Macedonia and the region’s ancient heritage was overcome in 2018.

But a newer dispute has emerged with Bulgaria, also centered on Balkan history, language and culture.

Following Bulgarian pressure, the EU has called on North Macedonia to change its constitution — inserting a reference to the existence of an ethnic Bulgarian minority — for the accession process to go ahead.

In exchange, Bulgaria would lift its objections to North Macedonia’s accession.

The previous, center-left government in Skopje had agreed to make the constitutional change, but failed to secure the required majority on parliament. North Macedonia’s new conservative government strongly opposes the proposed change, and is doing all it can to delay it.