(SKOPJE) - More than 87 percent of Macedonians want their country to become a member of the European Union, a survey presented on Thursday showed.

Macedonia's deputy Prime Minister Ivica Bocevski said that only 4.5 percent of those polled said they were opposed to the former Yugoslav republic joining the EU.

"For 64 percent of those questioned, membership in the EU is the most important issue," said Bocevski, who is also in charge of European integration.

For almost half of the 1,200 people questioned, EU membership would "bring better living standards" in the country with an average monthly salary of about 400 euros (620 dollars), Bocevski told reporters.

Brussels is yet to set a date for membership talks to begin for Macedonia, which was made an official EU candidate in December 2005, four years after it narrowly averted a civil war with its large ethnic Albanian majority.

EU enlargement chief Olli Rehn said in March that Macedonia could begin talks on becoming a member of the European Union later this year.

However Rehn said there were eight key policy areas in which the European Union expected more progress to be made, among them police and judicial reforms, and the fight against corruption.

But the key stumbling block for Macedonia's future membership is its more than 15-year-old dispute with Greece over its right to the name "Macedonia," shared by a northern Greek region.

A veto by Athens over the name dispute led to Macedonia walking out of a NATO summit in Bucharest in April after it was refused membership of the transatlantic alliance.

After the collapse of the old Yugoslav federation, Macedonia was recognised by the United Nations in 1993 as the "Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" (FYROM).

Text and Picture Copyright 2008 AFP. All other Copyright 2008 EUbusiness Ltd. All rights reserved. This material is intended solely for personal use. Any other reproduction, publication or redistribution of this material without the written agreement of the copyright owner is strictly forbidden and any breach of copyright will be considered actionable.