NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg | Emmanuel Dunand/AFP via Getty Images Macedonia to sign NATO pact this week Country to start NATO accession after settling decades-long name dispute with Greece.

North Macedonia will on Wednesday begin the process to join NATO, the secretary general of the military alliance announced Saturday.

“On 6 February we will write history: #NATO Allies will sign the accession protocol with the future Republic of North Macedonia,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg tweeted.

The move comes after the Balkan state agreed to change its name to North Macedonia to settle a decades-long dispute with Greece.

Greece had argued the country’s name infringed on its northern province, also called Macedonia, blocking the country’s membership in NATO and the European Union. The Greek parliament ratified the name change January 25.

Macedonia’s Foreign Minister Nikola Dimitrov will travel to Brussels to take part in Wednesday’s ceremony along with representatives from the 29 NATO member countries.

On 6 February we will write history: #NATO Allies will sign the accession protocol with the future Republic of North Macedonia together with FM @Dimitrov_Nikola. pic.twitter.com/vyJVHJm9D5 — Jens Stoltenberg (@jensstoltenberg) February 2, 2019

The accession protocol must then be signed off by each NATO member.

“The ratification will take some time, it depends on all 29 parliaments,” Stoltenberg told POLITICO in a recent interview. “Last time it took around a year,” he said, referring to Montenegro’s 2017 accession to the alliance.

However, “as soon as we have signed the accession protocol, Skopje will start to sit at the table,” he said.

Prime Minister Zoran Zaev said he also hopes to move forward on talks to join the EU.

"We hope that by June we will have presented strong arguments to the European Council for getting a date for opening accession negotiations," Zaev said this week, RadioFreeEurope reported.