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| - North Macedonia's main parties on Monday called for a postponement of the snap poll slated for mid-April, arguing the need to contain the coronavirus. The small and poor Balkan state, where 19 new coronavirus infections have been recorded, has already imposed heavy restrictions on public life to prevent an outbreak. Authorities have banned all public and private gatherings, closed schools and shuttered restaurants and other entertainment venues nationwide. On Monday leaders of the country's major parties agreed to meet for talks with the president about delaying the election set for April 12. "Our health and the health of those close to us is at stake," former prime minister Zoran Zaev, leader of the Social Democrats, told journalists. "It is more than clear that these conditions do not allow the normal organisation of elections," he added. His chief rival in the right-wing VMRO-DMPNE agreed. "There is no reasonable, no human, rational and pragmatic reason for not postponing (the elections)," the party's leader Hristijan Mickoski said at an outdoor press conference. The snap poll was called after Zaev failed to get the green light from the European Union to start North Macedonia's membership talks last October. That had been the core aim of his administration -- a project that included the politically divisive decision to change the country's name to North Macedonia to assuage a long-running dispute with neighbours Greece. Although the EU applauded the diplomatic breakthrough and said North Macedonia had met all of its reform conditions to start negotiations, France used its veto to scupper the process. The bloc is now making another push to get all member states on board to approve the start of talks ahead of an EU summit in May. str-ssm/jj
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