NATO
New membership in the alliance has been largely from Central and Eastern Europe, including former members of the Warsaw Pact. Accession to the alliance is governed with individual Membership Action Plans, and requires approval by each current member. NATO currently has two candidate countries that are in the process of joining the alliance: Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Republic of Macedonia.
In NATO official statements, the Republic of Macedonia is always referred to as the "former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia", with a footnote stating that "Turkey recognizes the Republic of Macedonia under its constitutional name". Though Macedonia completed its requirements for membership at the same time as Croatia and Albania, who joined NATO in 2009, its accession was blocked by Greece pending a resolution of the Macedonia naming dispute. In order to support each other in the process, new and potential members in the region formed the Adriatic Charter in 2003. Georgia was also named as an aspiring member, and was promised "future membership" during the 2008 summit in Bucharest, though in 2014, US President Barack Obama said the country was not "currently on a path" to membership.
Accession of Macedonia to NATO
The accession of Republic of Macedonia to NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) is currently pending. NATO's invitation to the Republic of Macedonia was blocked by Greece at the 2008 Bucharest summit. NATO nations agreed that the country would receive an invitation upon resolution of the Macedonia naming dispute. Greece feels that its neighbor's constitutional name implies territorial aspirations against its own region of Macedonia. After the veto, Greece was sued in the International Court of Justice, over the use of "the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" as an acceptable option to enter NATO with, while Greece counterargues that it was a collective decision of NATO not to invite Macedonia and therefore the interim accord signed between the two countries was not violated. Greece may also block Macedonia's accession to the European Union over the naming dispute. Former United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has asked Macedonia and Greece to find an "acceptable solution" to the dispute, so that Macedonia will be free to join NATO. In 2014, prior to its 65th anniversary since its creation, NATO announced that it would not be offering any new countries membership into the organization that year. Some analysts, such as Jorge Benitez of the Atlantic Council think tank, argued that this reluctance was partly due to the new security climate after Russia's annexation of Crimea.