UMD is proud to announce that His Excellency Dr. Ahmet Davutoglu, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Turkey, will be presented with the UMD Macedonia Friendship Award at the UMD Gala in Chicago on May 19, 2012, in advance of the NATO Summit.

UMD is proud to announce that His Excellency Janez Jansa, the Prime Minister of Slovenia, will be presented with UMD’s highest honor – the UMD Goce Delchev Award – at a Gala, this Saturday, May 19, 2012, in honor of His Excellency Dr. Gjorge Ivanov, the President of Macedonia, in advance of the NATO Summit in Chicago. The Macedonian community of Slovenia, estimated between 17,000 – 20,000, applauded UMD’s decision today.

With PBS Ombudsman Michael Getler as moderator, Professor Michael Haltzel of Johns Hopkins University raised the question of Macedonia’s accession to NATO at the upcoming Chicago Summit, considering the favorable decision of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in December. Daalder first stated that “the issue is very simple” and that Macedonia would not be invited to NATO unless a “mutually satisfactory” resolution of the name dispute is found with Greece. He also stated: “Since Greece has insisted that it needs to resolve the name issue prior to being willing to say yes to an invitation ... an invitation will not be forthcoming.” He added: “That is how this organization works. We are not going to have the ICJ or anybody else telling NATO when and how it should take in new members.”

UMD is deeply concerned about the latest reported incident of religious intolerance, which took place at a rally in downtown Skopje. Alleged Islamist militants chanted "Death to Christians" on the city streets, and young men brandished what appeared to be Hezbollah and Jihadist symbols. Around 1,500 protestors demanded the release of suspects arrested by police, in connection with the cold-blooded assassination of five Macedonian men on the eve of Macedonian Orthodox Easter.

UMD is pleased to inform that our friends, the National Federation of Croatian Americans Cultural Foundation (NFCA CF), the voice of over half a million Croatian-Americans, sent a letter to President Obama encouraging his “unbridled support for the Republic of Macedonia's bid for full NATO membership during the upcoming Chicago Summit.”