The Republic of North Macedonia is a landlocked country in the south-central Balkans.  It is bordered by Kosovo and Serbia to the north, Bulgaria to the east, Greece to the south, and Albania to the west. North Macedonia formally applied in March 2004 and was granted EU candidate status on 17 December 2005.

The country acceded to the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, on January 1994.  North Macedonia's asylum system has undergone several reforms, notably with the adoption of the Law on International and Temporary Protection (LITP) in 2018, which aims to align national practices with international and EU standards. The Sector for Asylum (SfA), Nested within the Ministry of Interior, is the single authority responsible for first-instance refugee-status determination (RSD) and subsidiary-protection decisions. It manages registration, interviews and decisions under the LITP under the Ministry of Interior, is responsible for refugee status determination (RSD). Negative decisions can be appealed to the Administrative Court, which has the power to annul SfA rulings and remand them for reconsideration. While the 2018 reforms have brought North Macedonia’s asylum law much closer to EU and UNHCR standards, practical challenges in family reunification, mobility rights and efficient handling of repeat claims continue to hamper both access to protection and effective integration.