Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan challenges Greece once again extending Turkey’s support to the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) over the ‘Macedonia’ name dispute, which has reached a critical point.

Referring to FYROM as “our brothers”, he said that Ankara would always stand by Skopje.

“For us Ankara and Skopje have no difference and we will not leave our brothers alone and we will always be with them,” Erdogan said.

The statements were made during a conference attended by immigrants from Balkan countries now living in Turkey, report Vesnik.com and Daily.mk.

Erdogan went as far as to say that Athens was in the wrong, and that insistence on FYROM changing its name before joining NATO was “unfair”.

The statements follow the demonstration in Greece over the weekend, which saw just short of 150,000 people turn out to Athens’ central square to protest again FYROM using the ‘Macedonia’ in its official name.