Short history of MACEDONIA

Short history of Macedonia

Although Macedonia is a young state which became independent in 1991, its roots run deep in the history. The name "Macedonia" is in fact the oldest surviving name of a country in the continent of Europe. Archaeological evidence shows that old European civilization flourished in Macedonia between 7000 and 3500 BC. Macedonia is located in the center of the Southern Balkans, north of ancient Greece, east of Illyria, and west of Thrace. The ancient Macedonians were a distinct nation, ethnically, linguistically, and culturally different from their neighbors. The origins of the Macedonians are in the ancient Brygian substratum which occupied the whole of Macedonian territory and in Indo-European superstratum, which settled here at the end of the 2^nd millennium.

Ancient Macedonia

The history of the ancient Macedonian kingdom begins with Caranus, who was the first known king (808-778 BC). The Macedonian dynasty Argeadae originated from Argos Orestikon, a city in located in south western Macedonia region of Orestis (App.,Syr., 63;Diod. ,VII, 15; G. Sync., I, 373). Alexander I "Philhellene" (498-454 BC) expended the kingdom and by the 5^th century BC the Macedonians had forged a unified kingdom. Alexander was a Persian ally in the Greek-Persian wars. As Macedonia appears on the international scene, the first coins with the king's name on them are made. Around the year 460, Herodotus sojourns in Macedonia and gives an interpretatio macedonica of the Greek-Persian wars (Her.5.17-22, 9.44-45).

Alexander�s son Perdiccas II (453 - 413 BC) worked on starting a war between the Athens maritime power and Sparta which lead the Peloponnesian League (Thucydides.Pel.I.57) and initiated the creation of an Olynthian league from the Greek colonies neighboring Macedonia on Chalcidice, for a war against Athens (Thucyd.I.58). During the Peloponnesian War, Perdiccas is one moment on the side of Athens and the next on the side of Sparta, depending of Macedonia�s best interests, not wanting either of them to become too powerful, while keeping its country�s sovereignty at the expense of the Greek quarrel.

It was Archelaus (413-399 BC) who made Macedonia a significant economic power. Archelaus made straight roads, built fortresses, and reorganized the Macedonian army (Thucyd.II.100). He moved the Macedonian capital Aigae to Pella and founded Macedonian Olympian Games in Dion (the holy city of the Macedonians), among other reasons also because of the fact that the Greek Olympic Games were forbidden to the barbarians, including the Macedonians as well (Her.V.22). In the year 406 the Macedonian poet Adaius wrote an epitaph for the grave stone of Euripides (Anth.Pal.7,5,1; A. Gellius, Noct. Att, XV, 20, 10) who was staying in the Macedonian palace of Archelaus. Euripides besides the apologetic work "Archelaus" also wrote the well known play "Bachae" inspired by the Macedonian cult for the God Dionysus. The Macedonian council refused to give Euripides' body to his birthplace Athens (Gell.Noct.Att.XV.20). During the years 407/6 Archelaus from Athens received the titles proxenos and euergetes.

Amyntas III reigned 393-370/369 BC and led a policy of exhausting and weakening of the Greek city states. His two of his sons, Alexander II and Perdiccas III, reigned later only briefly. Alexander II however, had an expansionist policy and invaded northern Greece. In Thessaly he left Macedonian garrisons in the cities and refused to evacuate them. The Thebans who were at the time the most powerful militarily intervened and force the removal of the garrisons. Alexander II's youngest brother Philip was taken as hostage to Thebes. After the death of Alexander II, his other brother Perdiccas III took the throne. But Perdiccas III was killed with 4,000 of his Macedonian soldiers in a battle with the Illyrians, and Amyntas' third son, Philip II now became the next Macedonian king.

Philip II (359-336 BC) the greatest man that Europe had ever given (Theop.F.GR.H. f, 27) liberated and unified Macedonia and turned it into the first European Power in the modern sense of the word - an armed nation with a common national ideal. He subdued all of Macedonia's neighbors (Illyrians, Thracians, and Greeks), and made Macedonia the most powerful kingdom in the Balkans. He was especially brutal towards the Greek cities at the edge of Macedonia. He razed them all to the ground, including the major Greek center of Olynthus, and Stageira, Aristotle's birthplace, and sold the inhabitants to slavery. In 338, the Greeks unified to prevent Philip from penetrating southern Greece, but the Macedonians defeated the Greeks at the battle at Chaeronea. Philip became a hegemon to the Greeks who had no choice but to ratify his peace agreement koine eirene. The Greeks had to swear that they would obey the conditions and that they will not rebel, not only against Philip, but also against his successors as well. The four Macedonian stratigical garrisons at Corinth, the Theban Cadmeia, Chalcis on Euboea and Ambracia, were a guarantee the Macedonian hold of Greece. This mutual peace - koine eirene dictated by the conqueror, was not a league at all (it did not have the word symachia), but a fiction which was to disguise Macedonian dominance in Greece, a temporary institution for including the Greek polis in the monarchy much more easily. But the conqueror of Greece was assassinated before he could lead the Macedonians in the conquest of the Persian Empire during the wedding celebrations of his daughter Cleopatra.

His son Alexander III the Great (356-323 BC), succeeded his father at the age of 20, and immediately put down the rebellions of the Thracians, Illyrians, and Greeks, who revolted upon hearing of Philip's death. In Greece, he razed the major center of Thebes to the ground after a slaughter of 6,000 people and sold its 30,000 inhabitants to slavery, as warning to the Greek what would happen if they were to rebel again. Next, at the head of Macedonian and allied Greek, Illyrian, and Thracian troops, he invaded Persia. The Greek soldiers did not participate in any of the battles because they were hostages for peace and a guarantee for safety of the Macedonian occupation forces in Greece. Not only did they not have an important role in any of the battles but there were no Greek commanders either since the Macedonians commanded their ranks. Alexander's victories at Granicus, Issus, and Gaugamela put an end to the Persian Empire, which was then replaced by the Macedonian Empire stretching between Europe, Egypt and India. From this time until the arrival of Rome, the Macedonians will shape the events in this vast space for almost 3 centuries.

Alexander's death brought the Macedonian leading generals into a terrible conflict over the rule of the Empire. But first, the rebellions of the Greeks were put down with the massacres of the 23,000 Greek mercenaries in Asia (Diodorus, 18.7.3-9), and the bloody end of the Lamian (Hellenic) War in which the united Greeks failed to win freedom yet again (Diodorus, 18.10.1-3, 11, 12, 15, 17.5). By 300 BC, the Macedonian Empire was carved up between the dynasties of Antigonus I "One-Eye" (Macedonia and Greece), Ptolemy I (Egypt), and Seleucus I (Asia). Under Antigonus II Gonatas (276-239), the grandson of Antigonus I, Macedonia achieved a stable monarchy and strengthened its occupation of Greece. His grandson Philip V (222-179 BC), clashed with Rome which was now expanding eastwards, and fought the two "Macedonian Wars" against the Romans. After the Roman army defeated Philip in Thessaly, Macedonia lost the whole of Greece and was reduced to its original borders. In the third "Macedonian War", Rome finally defeated the Macedonian army under the last king the Philip's son Perseus (179-168 BC) and at the Battle of Pydna, 20,000 Macedonian soldiers died while defending their land. Perseus died prisoner in Italy, the Macedonian kingdom ceased to exist, and by 146 Macedonia became a Roman province.

By 65 BC Rome conquered the Seleucid Macedonian kingdom in Asia under its last king Antiochus VII. Finally, the defeat of Cleopatra VII in 30 BC, brought an end to the last of the Macedonian descendants in Egypt, and with it, the last remains of the Macedonian Empire that was once the mightiest in the world disappeared from the face of the earth.

Roman Macedonia

In 51 AD for the first time on European soil, in the Macedonian towns Philippi, Thessalonica and Beroea, the Apostle Paul preached Christianity (Acta apos., XVI, id. XVII). In 52 and 53 he sent epistles to the people of Thessalonica (Epist. Thess); in 57 he came to Macedonia again, and in 63 he sent epistles to the people of Philippi (Epist. Philipp). During the 3^rd and 4^th centuriesbecause of the Gothic attacks the Macedonian towns built fortresses around them, Macedonia was divided into two provinces, Macedonia Prima and Macedonia Salutarus.

Since the east-west split of the Roman Empire in 395 AD, Macedonia was ruled by the Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantine Empire). It is interesting to note that the Emperor Justinian was born in Skopje, Macedonia. In the 5^th century Macedonia was divided again into Macedonia Prima and Macedonia Secunda. In the 6^th century, an earthquake demolished Scupi (nowadays Skopje) and Slavs overrun both Macedonia and Greece and mixed with the ancient Macedonians and Greeks. Thus the foundations for the modern Macedonian and Greek nations were laid. In the 7^th century the Turko-Mongolic Bulgars entered the Balkan Peninsula and populated Thrace. In time they mixed with the Slavs and ancient Thracians who already lived there and laid the foundations of the modern Bulgarian nation.

In the 9^th century, while the Byzantine Empire was ruled by the Macedonians Emperors of the Macedonian Dynasty, the Macedonian brothers Cyril and Methodius from the largest Macedonian city of Salonica, created the first Slavonic alphabet, founded the Slavic literacy, and promoted Christianity among the Slavic peoples. Their disciples Kliment and Naum of Ohrid established the first Slavonic University, the Ohrid Literary School. 3,500 teachers, clergy, writers, and other literary figures emerged from this Ohrid Literary School. Their activity was crowned with the laying of foundations of a Slavonic cultural, educational and ecclesiastical Organization, where the Slavonic alphabet was used and the Old Slavonic language was introduced in religious services. The establishment of the first Slavic bishopric, later to become an Ohrid Archbishopric during the reign of Samuel, marked the beginning of the Macedonian Orthodox Church.

In the first half of the 10^th century, the Bogomil teaching appeared in Macedonia. Bogomilism had grown into a large-scale popular movement and it spread through the Balkans and Europe. The 10^th century also marked the beginning of the first Macedonian Slavic State, the Kingdom of Tsar Samuel (976-1014). Towards the end of the 10th century, with the weakening of the Eastern Roman Empire, and with the first Bulgarian Empire apart, Tsar Samuel created a strong Macedonian medieval kingdom with its center at Ohrid. Soon he conquered parts of Greece, Epirus, a large part of Bulgaria, Albania, Serbia, Bosnia, Montenegro and Dalmacia. This was not a Bulgarian state, but an independent Macedonian State with a capital in Ohrid, Macedonia, not in Preslav, Bulgaria where the Bulgarian kings ruled. Samuel was defeated in 1014 by Basil II when the Byzantine army won the battle on Mount Belasica capturing 15,000 of his soldiers. All were blinded, except one in every one hundred, who were left with one eye to lead the rest back to Samuel who escaped death at Belasica. At the site Samuel suffered a stroke and died two days later on October 6, 1014.

For four centuries after the fall of the kingdom, rebellions and frequent changes of rule disrupted Macedonia's development. In the 11^th century, there were two major uprisings against Byzantine rule, one led by Petar Deljan in 1040, Samuel's grandson, and the other by Gjorgji Vojteh in 1072. The 12^th century saw the rise of the Macedonian feudal lords Dobromir Hrs in 1201, and Strez in 1211.

Ottoman Macedonia

Despite the rebellions, and the short-lived Serbian and Bulgarian occupations in the 13^th and 14^th centuries, Macedonia remained a Byzantine territory until the Ottoman Turks conquered it in 1389. The Turks firmly established themselves not only in Macedonia, but in all of the Southern Balkans. Ottoman rule will last for five centuries. The first significant resistance movements against the Turkish occupation were the Mariovo-Prilep Rebellion (1564 - 1565), and the Karposh Uprising in 1689.In the 18th century, under the pressure of the Greek Patriarch in Istanbul, the Turks abolished the Ohrid Archbishopric, which had been keeping alive the spiritual soul of the Macedonians for centuries since the times of Tsar Samuel.

 In the 19th century, Greece, Serbia, and Bulgaria freed themselves from the Turkish rule and actively become conspiring against the Macedonians displaying territorial aspirations on their land. These indigenous states all became in different ways stalking horses for the aspirations of the European Great Powers. The so-called "Macedonian Question" appeared which is nothing else but a competition for a new conquest of Macedonia by their neighbors. The Greeks, Bulgarians, and Serbs employed many weapons in this conflict. They included the opening of schools in an attempt to inculcate a particular linguistic and confessional identity, the control of ecclesiastical office, influence over the course of railway building, diplomatic attempts to secure the ear of the Turkish Sultan. The Greeks and the Bulgarians begun sending guerrilla bands into Macedonia to and use terror to "convince" the population of its "true identity". But the Macedonians strove to develop their own national consciousness and begun organizing themselves for fight against the Turks at the same time, a process that their neighbors tried everything to interrupt. Thus, the nineteenth century is a period of growing national awareness among the Macedonian people and their quest for free and independent Macedonia.

The Independence Movement

Literacy and education flourished and the foundations of modern Macedonian literature were laid. The leading activists were Kiril Pejchinovich, Joakim Krchovski, Partenija Zografski, Georgija Puleski, Jordan Hadzi Konstantinov - Dzinot, Dimitar and Konstantin Miladinov, Grigor Prlicev, and Kuzman Sapkarev. The second half of the nineteenth century was marked by the beginning of the national revolutionary struggle for the liberation of Macedonia. The Razlovtsi and Kresna Uprisings, in 1876 and 1878 respectively, had a strong influence on the growth of Macedonian national awareness. Bishop Theodosius of Skopje started a campaign for an independent Macedonian Orthodox Church and tried to restore the Ohrid Archbishopric, which had been abolished in 1767. The Bulgarians effectively destroyed the idea. In 1893, the Macedonian revolutionary organization known as VMRO (Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization) was founded in the greatest Macedonian city of Salonica, with Gotse Delchev as its leader. Its objectives were national freedom and the establishment of an autonomous Macedonian state with the slogan "Macedonia for the Macedonians". Delchev's famous words were "I understand the world only as a cultural competition among the nations" and "Those who believe that answer of our national liberation lies in Bulgaria, Serbia or Greece might consider themselves a good Bulgarian, good Serb or a good Greek, but not a good Macedonian." In 1903 a group of Macedonian revolutionaries known as "Gemidzii" carried out a series of attacks on a number of buildings in Salonica in order to draw the attention of the European public towards the situation of the Macedonian people. Later on August 2, 1903, VMRO launched the Ilinden Uprising against the Turks and declared Macedonian independence. The revolutionaries liberated the town of Krushevo, and established the Republic of Krushevo with its own government. The uprising was brutally crushed by the Turks, but the Macedonian Question thereafter aroused intense international concern. The Great Powers made several attempts to impose reform on the Porte, including the sending of their own officers to supervise the gendarmerie - in effect, the first international peacekeeping force. And although the revolt was suppressed, Macedonians remember the brief victory as a key date in the country's history and the event is enshrined in Macedonia's constitution. In the same year, 1903, Krste Misirkov from Pella (Postol), one of the most outstanding names in the history of Macedonian culture, and the founder of the modern Macedonian literary language and orthography, published his "On Macedonian Matters", in which he projected the principles for standardization of the Macedonian literary language.

The Partition of Macedonia and World War I

In 1908 the Young Turk revolution. The Young Turk movement, lead by the Young Turk Committee, had the aim of reforming the Turkish country and making social and political reforms in Macedonia. The Macedonian revolutionary organization, through Jane Sandanski and the newly formed national federal party, actively took part in the Young Turk movement for achieving autonomy for Macedonia.

In 1912, Greece, Serbia, and Bulgaria joined forces and defeated the Turkish army in Macedonia. 100,000 Macedonians also participated and helped in the Turkish evacuation but the victors did not reward them. The Treaty of London (May 1913), which concluded the First Balkan War, left Bulgaria dissatisfied with the partition of Macedonia among the allies which resulted after the war. Bulgaria's attempt to enforce a new partition in a Second Balkan War failed, and the Treaty of Bucharest (August 1913) confirmed a pattern of boundaries that (with small variations) has remained in force ever since.

Having failed to achieve independence in 1903, the Macedonians, now divided, were left to their new masters. Greece tookthe biggest, southern half of Macedonia (Aegean Macedonia) and renamed it to "Northern Greece"; Bulgaria annexed the Pirin region and abolished the Macedonian name, and Serbia took over the Vardar region and renamed it to "Southern Serbia". N. Pasich of Serbia and E. Venizelos of Greece agreed on the newly formed Greek-Serbian border, so that there would be "only Serbs to the North and only Greeks to the South", and no "Macedonians" on either side. Thus the politics of assimilation had begun, as Macedonia's geographic, natural and ethnic unity was distroyed by its own neighbors. An intensive campaigning took place in all three parts of Macedonia to impose foreign identities upon the population that suited the interests of the controlling states. In Vardar Macedonia, the Serbs labeled the Macedonians with the name "South Serbs"; in Aegean Macedonia, the Greeks labeled them as "Slavophone Greeks", "MakedoSlavs", and other insulting names; while in Pirin Macedonia, the Macedonians were simply called Bulgarians.

In 1914, World War I erupted. Bulgaria sided with the Central powers and by 1915 it occupied the Serbian held part of Macedonia. But the defeat of the Central powers and the end of World War I in 1918 saw the partition of 1913 reconfirmed and Macedonia was left divided. At the Paris Peace conference the demands of the Macedonians for independent and united Macedonia were ignored. Vardar Macedonia was re-incorporated with the rest of Serbia and into the new Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes which was later renamed Yugoslavia.

World War II and the Liberation

Since 1913, official Greece has been trying to banish native Macedonian names of villages, towns, cities, rivers, and lakes in Aegean Macedonia. For example, the little stream which issues from Mount Olympus and flows into the Aegean Sea is labeled Mavroneri("black water") on the maps made by Greek cartographers after 1913. However, the same river appears as Crna Reka, a native Macedonian name meaning "black river" on the maps made before 1913. Kutlesh had been dropped for Vergina, and Kukush for Kilkis, together with at least 300 other places all over Aegean Macedonia. The Macedonians were also forced to renounce their native family names and use only new "Greek-sounding" names. In 1995, Human Rights Watch - Helsinki was a witness that even today the Macedonians are forbidden to carry their first and last Macedonian names. During the dictatorship of General Metaxis, the Macedonians were exposed to brutal oppression. The Macedonian language was forbidden, despite the fact under the supervision of the League of Nations Greece had recognized its existence as distinct language when it published the primer "Abecedar" for the needs of the Macedonian children in 1924. In the 1930's the Macedonians in Greece were punished for speaking of their native language by drinking of castor oil and were persecuted for expressing of their national identity. Yet despite the triple persecution the Macedonians never abandoned their nationality.

The period between the two world wars was also filled with constant endeavors to change the situation of Macedonia and annul the division of the country and its people. In 1925 VMRO (United) was founded in Vienna under the leadership of Dimitar Vlahov, Pavel Satev, Georgi Zankov, Rizo Rizov, Vladimir Pop Timov and Hristo Jankov. Their main objective was to free Macedonia within its geographical and economical borders and create an independent political unit that will become an equal member of the future Balkan Federation. In 1935, MANAPO (Macedonian National Movement) was founded in the Vardar part of Macedonia. In 1938The first collection of poems "Fire" ("Ogin") from Venko Markovski was published in Macedonian. In 1939 publication of "White Dawns" ("Beli Mugri"), a collection of poems in Macedonian from the first modern Macedonian poet Koco Racin. In 1940, the democratic groups in Macedonia defined the political program for the national and social liberation of the country.

With the World War II burning throughout Europe, Yugoslavia was invaded by the German army in April of 1941. Bulgaria, now fascist, again occupied almost all of Macedonia (both Vardar and Aegean) and collaborated with the Nazis for the departure of the Jews of Salonica to their deaths. On October 11, 1941, the Macedonians launched a war for the liberation of Macedonia from the Bulgarian occupation. By 1943, the anti-fascist sentiment lent support for the growing communist movement and soon thereafter, the Communist Party of Macedonia was established. In the same year, the first unit of the Army of Macedonia was founded. Bodies of government, such as national liberation councils, were formed over the whole territory of Macedonia. The Headquarters of the National Liberation Army (NOV) published the manifesto of the goals of the war of liberation. The first session of the Anti-Fascist Assembly of the National Liberation of Macedonia (ASNOM) was held in the monastery of St. Prohor Pchinski on 2 August 1944 on the 41^st anniversary of the Ilinden uprising. Representatives from all parts of Macedonia, including the Pirin and the Aegean parts of the country, gathered for the occasion and decided on the constitution of a modern Macedonian state as a member of the new Yugoslav federation under the name of Peoples Republic of Macedonia. The ASNOM presidium was formed with Metodija Andonov Cento was its first President and decision was reached to constitute a modern Macedonian country that will become part of the new Federal Yugoslavia. On April 1945 the first Macedonian government was founded with Lazar Kolisevski as its first President. The Ohrid Archbishopric was restored in 1958, and its autocephaly was declared in 1967. The Macedonians were finally free in one of the three parts of Macedonia.

The Greek Civil War and the Macedonians in Greece (Aegean Macedonia)

In Greece, after the Varkisa agreement (December 1945), the use of the Macedonian name and the Macedonian language were once again prohibited in the Aegean part of Macedonia and the Greek authorities started applying terror against the Macedonians. In the period of 1945-46 alone, according to statistics: 400 murders were registered; 440 women and girls were raped; 13,529 interned on the Greek islands; 8,145 imprisoned in the Greek prisons; 4,209 indicted; 3,215 sentenced to prison; 13 driven mad by the torture in the prisons; 45 villages abandoned; 80 villages pillaged; 1,605 families plundered; and 1,943 families evicted.

Therefore, during the Greek Civil War that followed World War II (1946-1949), the Macedonians of Aegean Macedonia fought on the side of the Greek Communist Party (KKE) simply because it promised them their rights after the war.Out of the 35,000 soldiers of DAG, about half were Macedonians. The liberated territory, covering mainly the territory of Aegean Macedonia. 87 Macedonian schools were opened for 100,000 pupils, the newspapers in Macedonian were published ("Nepokoren", "Zora", "Edinstvo", "Borec"), and cultural and artistic associations were created. But after two years of KKE's success in the civil war, the United States decided to side up against them, afraid that Greece would become another communist country. With the military support that came from the United States and Great Britain, the communists lost the war, and the Macedonians once again were stripped of their human rights.

The defeat of DAG resulted in terrible consequences for the Macedonians. 28,000 Aegean Macedonian children, known as 'child refugees', were separated from their families and settled in eastern Europe and Soviet Union in an attempt to save them from the terror that followed. Thousands of Macedonians lost their lives for the liberty of their people and a great number of the Macedonian villages were burned to the ground jut like the Greek army burned Kukush and the surrounding villages in the Balkan Wars.

In the late 1950's the inhabitants of several villages in the districts of Florina (Lerin), Kastoria (Kostur), and Edessa (Voden) were forced to take oaths in which they swore never again to speak "the local Slavic idiom," but to speak only Greek instead. Yet, the policy on denationalization continued to meet resistance among the Macedonians. The Macedonian language continued to be spoken in everyday communication and folklore as an expression of the Macedonian national affiliation. "The Macedonian Movement for Balkan Prosperity" withits main office in Salonica was founded, and "Rainbow" and some other organizations have been asking the international factors and the Greek government for legalization of the national and political rights of the Macedonians in Greece.

The Macedonians in Bulgaria (Pirin Macedonia)

The political changes after the capitulation of fascist Bulgaria and the coup d'etat of September 9, 1944 positively influenced the historical status of the Macedonians from the Pirin part of Macedonia. The Communist Party of Bulgaria, under the leadership of Geogi Dimitrov on August 9, 1946 officially recognized the Macedonian nation and the right of the Pirin part of Macedonia to be attached to the People�s Republic of Macedonia. The Macedonians in Bulgaria exist as separate nationality on all Bulgarian censuses after the end of World War II. The demography data from 1946 revealed that the majority of the population in the Pirin part of Macedonia declared itself as Macedonian in a free census. A period of cultural autonomy and affirmation of the Macedonian national and cultural values had begun. The Macedonian literary language and the national history have been introduced into the educational process. Almost 32,000 pupils were included into the teaching of Macedonian. In 1947 in Gorna Djumaja (Blagoevgrad nowadays) the first Macedonian bookstore and reading room were opened, as well as the Regional Macedonian National Theater. The newspapers in Macedonian such as "Pirinsko delo", "Nova Makedonija", "Mlad borec" etc. were also published. Literary circles and cultural and artistic associations were founded contributing to the spreading of the Macedonian culture. In the Bulgarian census of 1956, 63,7% of the population in Pirin declared itself as Macedonian. However, since 1956 Bulgaria has altered her attitude, negating again the existence of the Macedonian nation and forbidding the expression of Macedonian nationality and language. The idea for enforced and as result, in the census of 1965, the number of Macedonians dropped to only 8,750 and in the district of Blagoevgrad which previously had the highest percentage of Macedonians, it was less than 1%. But the fact that the Macedonians exist in Bulgaria can not be denied.  The Times Atlas of World History acknowledges in its map that Pirin Macedonia is entirely populated by Macedonians.  The recent archeological discovery in Aegean Macedonia in Greece confirmed that the Bulgarians had engaged in falsification of the history of Macedonia ever since the 19^th century. And finally, the Macedonians in Bulgaria began organizing themselves.  In 1989 the United Macedonian Organization - Ilinden (OMO Ilinden) was formed, demanding cultural and national autonomy for the Macedonians in Pirin.

Republic of Macedonia

As federal Yugoslavia was disintegrating at the beginning of 1990's, on September 8, 1991 in a referendum, 95% of eligible voters approved the independence and sovereignty of the Republic of Macedonia. Kiro Gligorov was elected the first president of independent Macedonia. The new constitution determined the Republic of Macedonia a sovereign, independent, civil, and democratic state, and it recognized the complete equality of the Macedonians and the ethnic minorities. It read "�Macedonia is constituted as a national country of the Macedonian people which guarantees complete civil equality and permanent mutual living of the Macedonian people with the Albanians, Turks, Vlachs, Roma and the other nationalities living in the Republic of Macedonia."

Although the European Community acknowledged that Macedonia had fulfilled the requirements for official recognition, due to the opposition of Greece, which was already a member of the community, the EC decided to postpone the recognition. Greece, afraid that Macedonia might put forward a historical, cultural, and linguistic, claim over Aegean Macedonia, insisted that the new nation has no right to use of the name "Macedonia" and use the emblem of ancient Macedonia on its flag. In July of 1992 there were demonstrations by 100,000 Macedonians in the capital Skopje over the failure to receive recognition. But despite Greek objections, Macedonia was admitted to the United Nations under the temporary reference (not an official name) "the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" in 1993. Full diplomatic relations with a number of EC nations followed, while Russia, China, Turkey, Bulgaria and most nations, ignored Greece's objections and recognized Macedonia under its constitutional name "Republic of Macedonia".

Greece slapped a trade embargo on Macedonia on February 1994 because of the refusal of the Macedonian President Gligorov to rename the country, nation, and language, and change the Constitution because Article 47 specifies that "the Republic of Macedonia cares for the statue and rights of those persons belonging to the Macedonian people in neighboring countries, as well as Macedonian ex-parties, assists their cultural development and promotes links with them." Ironically, Greece also has a similar article in her Constitution, as any other country in the world, to care for her minorities in the neighboring countries. But the embargo had devastating impact on Macedonia's economy as the country was cut-off from the port of Salonica and became landlocked because of the UN embargo on Yugoslavia to the north, and the Greek embargo to the south. Greece would remove the embargo only if Macedonia satisfies her demands and despite international criticism it did not lift the embargo. At the same time, Greece withdrew from the Greek - Macedonian talks, monitored by the UN as a mediator, and blocked any acceptance of Macedonia in the international institutions by using its power to veto new members. Faced with economic collapse, and left without any support from the international community, Macedonia was practically forced to change its flag and constitution, upon which Greece lifted the embargo. Ironically, in 1995 the Human Rights Watch - Helsinki, condemned Greece for the oppression of its ethnic Macedonian minority, which Greece denies it exists. Both Amnesty International and the European Parliament had also urged Greece to recognize the existence of the Macedonian language and stop the oppression of the ethnic Macedonians.

Tensions in North-Western Macedonia 

In 1994, Kiro Gligorov was re-elected president but he was seriously injured in 1995 in a car bombing. He was able to resume his duties in 1996. Tensions with the Albanian minority continued as some Albanian politicians begun criticizing the Macedonian government on international scene. The Albanians were very small minority in Macedonia after World War II. Since then, they emigrated in greater numbers from Albania into Macedonia looking for a better life and Macedonia opened its doors to them. By 1953, they composed 12.5% of Macedonia's population, and by encouraging large families they became faster growing element then the Macedonians and any of the other smaller minorities.

Today, the Albanians claim that their human rights are not fulfilled in Macedonia, that their statistical numbers are much higher then the recorded 23% in the censuses of the 1990's, and they demand a "cultural autonomy" in north-western Macedonia where they live in greater numbers among the Macedonians. This, despite the fact that Macedonia had always provided its Albanian minority with a freedom of having TV, radio, newspapers, elementary and high schools in their own language, and even ministers in the government, and despite the fact that international observers monitored the censuses of 1991 and 1994 and verified the results as accurate. Clearly a sharp contrasts and complete opposite to the plight of ethnic Macedonians in Greece, Bulgaria, and Albania, whose minimal human rights are not respected at all.

One final observation regarding the Albanians has to be made. The Albanians claim that they are descendants of the ancient Illyrians (the western neighbors of the ancient Macedonians) and some Albanians have gone as far as claiming part of Macedonia (as well as parts of Serbia, Montenegro, and Greece) as "Greater Albania". It should be stressed that the Albanians are not direct descendants of the ancient Illyrians. In fact, their original home has never been modern Albania, since in ancient times Albania was located in Asia on the Caucasus. The ancient Greek and Roman historians clearly mention the Albanians fighting on the side of the Persians against the Macedonian army of Alexander the Great and Plutarch wrote that they fought the Roman army under Ptolemy in Asia as well. The ancient geographers Ptolemy of Alexandria (2^nd century A.D.) and Strabo made clear maps of Albania in Asia (as well as of Macedonia separate from Greece, Illyria, and Thrace). The Albanians came to Europe and settled present day Albania many centuries later, becoming the latest arrivals on the Balkans, as there are being mentioned for first time in Europe many centuries after the arrival of the Slavs and Bulgars. By the time of their arrival, the modern Macedonian, Greek, and Bulgarian nations were already in the process of formation from the roots of the ancient Macedonian, Greek, and Thracian peoples, but the ancient Illyrians were far more assimilated and their name disappears from history. If the Albanians are therefore recognized as descendants of the Illyrians (although their link to any ancient Balkan nation is the weakest out of all modern nations due to the enormous time span), then it must be recognized that today's Macedonians are more then justified descendants of the ancient Macedonians (with Slav admixture from the 6^th century). Similarly the modern Greeks are descendants of the ancient Greeks (with Slav and Turkish admixture), and the modern Bulgarians are descendants of the ancient Thracians (with Bulgar and Slav admixture), a fact that these three nations are quite aware of in their own historiographies. In addition, the fact that the Albanians have retained their original Albanian name and not the Illyrian, unlike the Macedonians and the Greeks who still carry their ancient names, furthermore supports the fact that they are direct descendants of the Asian Albanians and not of the ancient European Illyrians. 

Thanks for that short history of Macedonia, I never knew about half of that. Has Aegean Macedonia been given back to Macedonia yet?

You check here http://www.macedonia-info.org/Makedonski_patriotski_pesni/ i don't know about the format or here from this radio station  (if you have sound forge or else it will be easy) http://217.16.69.2:8030/listen.pls

Greetings from Macedonia-The Land of Alexander The Great

Thanks for your valuable contribution of copy/pasting from propaganda sites!

However, be informed that I won't accept any kind of abusing this forum for political purposes and trolling will not be tolerated. Furthermore if you continue to insult Greece using deminishing characterizations you will be banned. Consider this as a warning. This is not a site for posting propaganda!

Now, to get things str8:

The issue of Macedonia is solved. Resident of the Greek province of Macedonia are Greeks. Residents of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia are not related to the ancient Macedonians. They're Slavs closely related to the Bulgarians.

I'm not saying this, the president of FYROMacedonia is:

Macedonia's former president Kiro Gligorov in the Toronto Star on March 15, 1992 said: "We are Macedonians but we are Slav Macedonians. That's who we are! We have no connection to Alexander the Greek and his Macedonia. The ancient Macedonians no longer exist, they had disappeared from history long time ago. Our ancestors came here in the 5th and 6th century (AD)."

In an interview with the Ottawa Citizen, Gyordan Veselinov, Macedonia's Ambassador to Canada said: "We are not related to the northern Greeks who produced leaders like Philip and Alexander the Great. We are a Slav people and our language is closely related to Bulgarian" and that "there is some confusion about the identity of the people of this country."

As for Slavomacedonians living in Greece and not being recognized by the state: There's a political party representing them, they took part in several elections and the best they could gather was 5000 votes. So give us a break!

The only historical dispute is if the ancient Macedonians were Greeks of a distinct tribe that became Hellenized. Some historian believe one some another. There are arguments supporting one or another opinion. But surelly they were not Slavs!

Macedonian, read the forum rules and behave. You have been warned.

Oh yeah Yanko (Yanis in Macedonian) you want copy/paste text well read this ok.And this is not propaganda this is the truth for Macedonia.

The most important thing to remember about the "Macedonian conflict" is that the Greek position has changed dramatically over the past decade. Official Greek government policy was that Macedonia did not exist. When Greece took over Aegean Macedonia in 1913, they killed, tortured and ethnically cleansed hundreds of thousands of Macedonians. They changed the names of people, villages, and landmarks from Macedonian to Greek in their attempts to eradicate the Macedonian name.

• After the Balkan Wars of 1912-13 and the partition of Macedonia: "Greece acquired the largest Macedonian territory, Aegean Macedonia. Even though this territorial acquisition did not necessarily satisfy its maximal pretensions in Macedonia, officially Athens claimed, as did Belgrade, that Macedonian and the Macedonian problem had ceased to exist. For the ruling elite in Greece, Aegean Macedonia became simply northern Greece and its Slavic-speaking Macedonians were proclaimed Greeks or, at best, 'slavophone' Greeks." Once the new rulers had consolidated their control over the respective parts of Macedonia, they initiated policies which aimed to destroy all signs of Macedonian nationalism, patriotism or particularism. This was to be accomplished through forced deportations and so-called voluntary exchanges of populations, colonization, social and economic discrimination, and forced denationalization and assimilation through the total control of the education systems and of cultural and intellectual life as a whole. These policies were pursued systematically and with great determination by Greece. 1

• "...Macedonia was split apart in 1912 when the Bulgarians, the Greeks and the Serbs united to push the Turks out of the Balkans. Succeeding in that, they split Macedonia between them. Aegean Macedonia was taken by Greece by conquest, never by any act of self-determination. Both Serbia and Greece tried to obliterate the name of Macedonia, and the use of the Macedonian language in the conquered territories. The northern portion was called South Serbia, the southern portion was called Northern Greece. For many years the Greeks avoided the use of the name Macedonia to describe its northern province."2

• "Only in the last three years have the Greeks decided to reclaim the name they abandoned and actually tried to suppress for so many years."3

• "Funnily enough, northern Greece was for so many years called just that, 'Northern Greece', and it had its own minister...the name Macedonia was considered somehow suspect."4

In the 1980's when it became evident that Yugoslavia was going to disintegrate and a part of Macedonia would become independent, Greece was afraid that they would lose Aegean Macedonia to a reunified Macedonian state. Therefore, propaganda that "Macedonia is 4000 years of Greek history" began. The very country that tried to destroy the Macedonian name now claims that Macedonia is Greek.

This is a non-issue. Before the Greek propaganda changed, you could not say the "M" word to a Greek. They vehemently denied the existence of such a land, people, or language. Now they claim that the land is Greek, but there are still no ethnic Macedonian people or language, that it is simply "Slavic" or "Bulgarian".

In Greece, the government tried to eliminate any trace of Macedonia. Since the independence of the Republic of Macedonia, however, a concerted programme was implemented in order to prove the "Greekness of Macedonia". Institutions such as the "University of Macedonia" opened in Solun (Greek name-Thessaloniki), the "Museum of Macedonia" and a news agency called the "Macedonian Press Agency".

• "In August 1988 Greece renamed "Northern Greece" as "Macedonia". Only since this renaming have Greek claims to Macedonian heritage gained widespread publicity." 5

• "...Greece did not refer to any part of its current territory as Macedonia until 1988, when Papandreou's government officially adopted the name Macedonia to replace that of Northern Greece. This point added weight to the notion that the dispute with Macedonia was a manufactured one." 6

Here is a quote from Traianos Hadjidimitriou, Greek journalist and former member of the Greek parliament.

• "Today, Macedonia is an accomplished fact. For 50 years, we Greeks avoided raising the issue, mostly under pressure from the United States. Today, ladies and gentlemen, we are paying for our own indifference and our lack of foresight."7

As Mr. Hadjidimitriou stated, Greeks avoided "raising the issue" of Macedonia. If it was such an integral part of Greek history, as they now claim, why didn't they always claim it to be Greek? Educated Greeks will admit to this, although they give excuses, because there is no way around the fact that they used to deny the very existence of Macedonia.

When the Republic of Macedonia was seeking international recognition of its independence in 1991, the Greek Council of Ministers defined its terms of recognition of this new state.

"It should not use the name 'Macedonia' which has a purely geographic and not an ethnic meaning. It should recognize that it has no territorial claims on our country. It should recognize that, in Greece, there is no 'Macedonian' minority". 8

The Greek government denies the existence of a Macedonian ethnicity,even worse it denies the existence of a Macedonian minority within its borders and refuses to grant these people their basic human rights. The United Nations and other international organizations recognizes each nation's right to self-determination. The Macedonians throughout the Balkans, regardless of what borders they find themselves in, have their own language, history, culture, and traditions. Greece and Bulgaria are the only two countries to continue to deny them this right.

"...they have carefully fostered this delusion, as if to give the impression both to their own people and to the world that there that there was no Slav minority in Greece at all; whereas, if a foreigner who did not know Greece were to visit the Florina (Lerin) region and from his idea of the country as a whole, he would conclude that it was the Greeks who were the minority. It is predominantly a Slav region not a Greek one. The language of the home, and usually also of the fields, the village street, and the market, is Macedonian, a Slav language." 9

• "Greek is regarded as almost a foreign language and the Greeks are distrusted as something alien, even if not, in the full sense of the word, as foreigners. This obvious fact, almost too obvious to be stated, that the region is Slav by nature and not Greek cannot be overemphasized." 10

• "...we note Greek claims that Northern Greece, or Aegean Macedonia, is 'more than 98.5% ethnically pure.' The purity is held to be Greek. However, the statement is not accepted by reputable opinion outside of Greece. For instance, the 1987 edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica indicated that there were still 180,000 Macedonian speakers in this area, indicating a much greater percentage than 1.5%. If Macedonian activists from these areas are correct, there may be as many as 1,000,000 people from Macedonian-speaking backgrounds in Aegean Macedonia." 11

• "For most of the past eighty years, the Greek government has consistently denied the existence of both a Macedonian nation and a Macedonian minority in northern Greece and has adopted a policy of forced assimilation toward the Slavic-speaking inhabitants of Aegean Macedonia." 12

• "The United Nations, the United States State Department, Amnesty International, and various chapters of Helsinki Watch throughout the world disagree with the Greeks, in particular, about the presence of Macedonians (and other minorities) in Greece and have pressured them in recent times to change their behaviour toward their Macedonian-speaking minority." 13

• "Greece is the only Southeast European country that does not recognize the presence of any national minorities in its territory. Turks are recognized as a mere �religious, Muslim� minority (which nevertheless is educated in Turkish), while Macedonians are not considered even a linguistic minority. The words �Turkish� and �Macedonian� have repeatedly led to the prosecution of their users, with courts handing down prison sentences or banning minority associations."14

• "Whereas, concerning the Muslims, the controversy relates to the character and the identity of the minority, when dealing with the Macedonians, there is a near unanimity in denying the very existence of any such minority, and supporting the persecution if not the prosecution of such claims." 15

• "The Macedonian minority continued to face various forms of harassment and discrimination in 1996. These included restrictions on freddom of cultural expression, violations of the freedom of association, harassment of its political party, Rainbow, denial of entry to Greece by ethnic Macedonians and former Greek citizens living abraod, and citizenship issues." 16

• "Greek Helsinki Monitor and Minority Rights Group-Greece urged that the Greek state finally recognize the Macedonian minority in Greece; allow its members to form associations; and grant the Macedonian refugees the right to return to Greece and to visit it. They also gave their support to the EU's encouragement to establish 'inter-cultural' schools where languages of minority groups would be instructed." 17

• "Since the civil war, the official denial of a Macedonian minority in Greece has remained constant regardless of the government in power, whether democratic or the military dictatorship of 1967-74."18

• "The Macedonian minority remained unrecognized by the Greek government and consequently faced various forms of harassment and discrimination. Ethnic Macedonian associations and particularly the Rainbow political party, continued to face difficulties. Established in September 1995, Rainbow was attacked by local Greek extremists, including the mayor of Florina, and hindered from operating freely."19

• "The official Greek position with regard to the ethnic composition of Greece is that there are no ethnic or national minorities in Greece at all."20

One of the worst examples of Greek discrimation against its Macedonian minority occurred in September, 1995. The Rainbow Party (the Macedonian minority party in Greece) hung up a sign in their office in Lerin displaying the words "Lerinski Komitet," (Lerin Committee) in their native Macedonian language as well as in Greek. Their office was subsequently burnt down by a mob of Greeks, including local officials, yet the Rainbow Party was charged under Article 192 of the Greek penal code for "inciting citizens to commit acts of violence upon each other"! The following is a quote from the Greek Helsinki Monitor after these events took place:

• "The co-operating organizations Greek Helsinki Monitor and Minority Rights Group - Greece condemn the violence against, the prosecutions of, and the setting on fire of the offices of the �Rainbow� minority party, a party which expresses the Greek citizens belonging to the �Macedonian national minority� (as it is recognized internationally but, unfortunately, not yet in Greece). Given the fact that the local authorities have played a leading role in these events, the conclusion is easily drawn that Greece, on the one hand, does not respect its international obligations on issues of freedom of expression and minority rights and, on the other hand, proves that the Macedonian ethnic minority is significant in magnitude (and not �a handful of agents� as most politicians and journalists usually claim) and, for this reason, it wants to suppress its political expression today as it had banned its cultural expression in the past (prohibition to establish a Shelter for Macedonian Culture, a case which is pending in the European Court for Human Rights [on 10 July 1998, Greece was convicted by that Court, for violation of the right to freedom of association]."

For more information on the Rainbow Party trial, including its verdict, please click here.

For yet another example of the existence of the ethnic Macedonian minority in Greece and Bulgaria, please have a look at the CIA Ethnic Map of the Balkans.

The spokesperson of the Greek Helsinki Monitor, Panayote Elias Dimitras, is actually an ethnic Greek, and is working hard for the achievement of human rights for the ethnic Macedonians. He faces numerous threats by fellow Greeks for his stance on the ethnic Macedonian minority. Unlike other Greeks who vehemently deny any human rights abuses, Mr. Dimitras is dedicated in his attempts to achieve equality for all in Greece. Some information can be viewed at the website of the Greek Helsinki Monitor.

The following quotes are from various Greek newspapers in reaction to the U.S. State Department's 1995 human rights report on Greece: 21

• "The despicable report of the State Department on the oppressed minorities in Greece..." - Eleftheros Typos, 8/3/96 p.4
• "...human rights which are allegedly oppressed in Greece" - Ta Nea, 19/3/96 p.6
• "Anti-Greek hysteria against our country via the report on human rights" - Apogevmatini, 10/3/96 p.10
• "The State Department sees minorities-ghosts" - Apogevmatini, 7/3/96 p.7
• "They maintain the matter of a 'Macedonian' minority in Greece" - Ethnos, 7/3/96 p.10
• "A concurrence of lies" - Apogevmatini, 10/3/96 p.10
• "Greece, say the agents of Washington, denies the existence of Slav-Macedonians in the country...they saw Turks...they saw Arvanites and Vlachs" - Eleftheros Typos, 8/3/96 p.4
• According to PASOK MP St.Papathemelis, the report is "offensive, inadmissable and all too clear fictitious, as far as Greece is concerned...The gentlemen who prepared the report must understand that there are neither a Turkish nor 'a Macedonian' minority and decide to honor the international conventions the USA have signed" - Apogevmatini, 8/3/96 p.6

• "The editor of The Sunday Telegraph argues that Greece has been ruthless in erasing traces of ethnic diversity, and suggests that the desperation of its actions, including the Greek claim to a monopoly of the classical past (in which all peoples of European origins have a share) can be explained by the fact that the Greeks today are a mixture of Slavs, Turks, Greeks, Bulgars, Albanians, Vlachs, Jews and Gypsies." 22

The official Greek government position is that there are no ethnic minorities in Greece, only the religious "Muslim minority" in Thrace. (recognized by the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923) Greece, however, refuses to allow this minority to call itself by its ethnic and national name, Turkish. Similarly, Greece denies the existence of the Macedonian, Albanian, Vlach, Pomak, and Arvanite communities (among many others) and refuses to grant them human rights.

• "More specifically, towards minorities, Greece's official attitude can be simply summarized in one sentence:"

  "In Greece there is only one minority recognized by international treaty, it is a religious minority, the Muslims of Thrace, it is blossoming and enjoying its full rights, and makes up some 1.5% of the total population." 23

The Greek government claims that in the entire country, there is only one minority, and that is a religious one. The human rights record of Greece towards all of its minorities, including the Turkish one, is horrendous, despite official Greek government claims.

The following is a quote from "The World Almanac '94", under the heading, "Greece".

• "Ethnic groups: Greeks 98.5%; Languages: Greek; Religions: Greek Orthodox 97% (official)." 24

How can one country be so homogenous? No other country in the world claims to have no ethnic minorities within its borders. It reflects the racist and intolerant attitude of the Greek government and the Greek population as a whole.

• "Modern Greek identity is based on an unshakable conviction that the Greek State is ethnically homogenous. This belief...has entailed repeated and official denial of the existence of minorities which are not of 'pure' Hellenic origin. The obsession with Greek racial identity involves the distortion of the history of the thousands of years when there was no such thing as a Greek nation state." 25

• "The following national, ethnolinguistic, religious, social and immigrant minority communities in Greece are monitored: Macedonians, Turks, Roma, Pomaks, Vlachs, Arvanites, Catholics, Protestants, Jehovah's Witnesses, New Relgious Movements and Immigrants. The composition of the minority population is Roma 3.3%, Arvanites 2%, Macedonians 2%, Vlachs 2%, Turks 0.5% and Pomaks 0.3%. (Mostly illegal) immigrants make up some 5-6%. The religious minorities make up 1%. The members of minority groups - ethnic and relgious - and the immigrants have all been subjected to various forms of discrimination." 26

• "What is the word for this obsessive Greek pseudo-relationship with their country's past (they even have a magazine, Ellenismos, devoted to the subject)? It is not quite pretentiousness. There is too much passion for that. No, the Greeks, the ancient ones, had a word for the modern Greek condition: paranoia. We must accept that Mr. Andreas Papandreou (Greek prime minister at the time) and the current EC presidency are the sole legitimate heirs of Pericles, Demosthenes and Aristide the Just. The world must nod dumbly at the proposition that in the veins of the modern Greek...there courses the blood of Achilles. And their paranoid nationalism is heightened by the tenuousness of that claim." 27

• "In retrospect it is clear to me that my 12 years of Greek schooling, mainly in the 1970's, conspired to instill in me precisely one attitude: an almost unshakable belief in the purity and unity of the Greek people, language and culture...Belief in the continuity of Greece against all odds was enabled also by the method of withholding information and sealing off interpretive paths. We had, as children, neither the capacity nor the inclination to explore disunities and 'impurities'" 28

• "If Metropolitan Greece (Hellada) had lost the glory of the ancient Hellenic culture and become a land which, from the economic and social standpoint, had declined, with only the marble tablets left to remind us of an ancient culture, then how can we talk of a medieval Greek state and claim that the Byzantine state was the Greek nation?... The name Hellene became a synonym for an evil person, an anti-Christian, and was despised, which is why the name Graeco was accepted, though it also was considered as being something humble... It was only after 1054, when the Schism between Catholic and Orthodox took place in the Church, that the term Graecos acquired a religious meaning and was used to signify something which was not Roman... ("His mother was a Christian, his father was a Hellene" - Cypriot proverb)... Up to the 14th century the terms Hellene and Hellenic were not to be encountered in the state language. These names came into use later on... And since they lived in the same land as the ancient Hellenes, and Hellenic history was full of Hellenic feats, to their eyes the ancient Hellenes seemed to have been a magnificent people possessed of great capabilities, including a great trading ability ... even the Macedonian campaign of Alexander the Great and his great victories were considered as achievements of the Hellenes." 29

• "Viewed in the light of the general situation in Europe, Greece's present foreign policy has shown that the country's modern ideological armour is still very much the product of a nationalist upbringing, the roots of which go back to somewhere around the beginning of the nineteenth century. But the nation will never find its way in the European Union carrying this sort of ideological baggage. One of the cornerstones of this ideology is the unrealistic theory that the modem Greeks, expressing as they do the enduring nature of the Greek language, are the biological descendants of the ancient Greeks. It was concocted in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to serve as an ideological arsenal in the efforts to create a modern Greek nation in view of the impending collapse of the feudal, theocratic Ottoman Empire." 30

• "A large segment of modern Greek society, which has never really embarked upon the process of ideological modernisation, oscillates desperately between modernism and Greek Orthodox fundamentalism, displaying an inherent inability to make any sort of ideological distinction between the terms 'race', nationality', and 'cultural or ethnic identity'. Apart from the fact that even well-respected journalists are engaged in daily attempts to convince the younger generation that we are directly descended from 'our ancient forebears', views that go against the theory of 'one race, one religion, one nation' are regarded as nationally reprehensible. It is on this theory that most Greeks base their belief that there are no minorities in our country, apart from the 'Greek Moslems' of Western Thrace. Greek citizens who have publicly proclaimed that they do not feel like Greeks but like ethnic Macedonians or ethnic Turks have been pursued and convicted by Greek justice, which just goes to show that modem Greek society not only fails to show the necessary respect for what is different, but cannot even tolerate it. And, being in the grip of a virulent Hellenocentric egomania, this same society, while denying Greek citizens the right to any ethnic identity other than Greek, constantly exhorts Greeks living in other countries to preserve their Greek ethnic identity.

  Personally, I couldn't care less what race the citizens of modern Greece belong to; the only purpose of this book is to show, and substantiate with written documentation, how rotten and historically untenable obsessive nationalism is, in the hope of infusing as many young people as possible with respect for the right to self-determination of every Greek citizen and every ethnic group that calls itself a minority, as long as the country's laws and territorial integrity are respected." 31

The following is a European Union-sponsored survey published in "Eurobarometer" in June 1993 in which 1,200 Greeks participated. It further illustrates the racist attitudes of Greek society.

"...only 21% of Greeks considered tolerance as one of the qualities parents should try to encourage in their children (vs. 42-62% in the other countries and even 29% in former East Germany). Greeks also had the highest percentage of intolerance towards people with different nationality, race or religion (an average 28% vs. 6%-27% for the other peoples). More specifically:"

• 90% of Greeks believe that "foreigners in our country take our jobs away" and 84% believe that "many of the foreigners who live in our country constitute a public hazard"
• 89% of Greeks have an aversion to Turks
• 76% of Greeks have an aversion to Albanians
• 62% of Greeks have an aversion to Western Thrace Turks and
• 52% want them "all to go back to Turkey"
• 57% of Greeks have an aversion to Jews
• 55% of Greeks have an aversion to Gypsies and 48% believe that "even if their living conditions improve, the Gypsies will go on being dirty"
• 38% of Greeks have an aversion to Slavs

"(Survey by Opinion (1,200 interviews, 20/1-20/2/93), for the Lambrakis Research Foundation: prepared by a team of academics under C. Tsoukalas and El. Nikolakopoulos and financed by the European Union; the survey was 'buried' by its sponsors and revealed in the Greek press by GHM on International Human Rights day, 10/12/95)." 32

Two things to remember:

1. It is ironic that Greeks now "love Macedonia" when they tried to eradicate its very existence.

2. If Macedonia has always been Greek, why did the Greek government deny its existence until the 1980's?

References

1. Panorama - Vol.2 No.1, Macedonian Cultural Society "ISKRA", Adelaide, 1996; p.19 (quotation by Dr. Andrew Rossos)
2. Ibid; p.101 (quotation by Dr. John Shea)
3. Ibid; p.101
4. Canberra Times, Thursday March 12 1992, p.9; Peter Hill
5. Macedonia and Greece - The Struggle to Define a New Balkan Nation, John Shea, McFarland and Company Inc., North Carolina, 1997; p.104
6. Ibid; p.282
7. Reed, Fred A., Salonica Terminus, Burnaby, Talonbooks, 1996; p.186
8. Greek Monitor of Human and Minority Rights, Minority Rights Group and Greek Helsinki Monitor, Volume 1, No. 3, 1995; p.23
9. Report on the Free Macedonia Movement in Area Florina - 1944, by British Captain P.H. Evans, Force 133, stationed in Aegean Macedonia during WWII; (quoted from The Macedonians of Aegean Macedonia: A British Officer's Report, 1944, Andrew Rossos, The Slavonic and East European Review, Volume 69 Number 2, April 1991; p.293
10. Ibid.
11. Macedonia and Greece - The Struggle to Define a New Balkan Nation, John Shea, McFarland and Company Inc., North Carolina, 1997; p.105
12. Ibid; p.108
13. Ibid; p.120
14. OSCE Review Conference - Human Dimension Issues, Report by the International Helsinki Federation, Vienna, 1999
15. Report about Compliance with the Principles of the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, Greek Helsinki Monitor & Minority Rights Group-Greece, Kifisia, 1999; p.3
16. Annual Report 1997- International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights, IHF, Vienna, 1997; p.126
17. Ibid; p.128
18. The Balkans - Minorities and States in Conflict, Hugh Poulton, Minority Rights Group, Minority Rights Publications, London, 1991; p.179
19. Annual Report 1998- International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights, IHF, Vienna, 1998;
20. The Macedonian Conflict, Loring M. Danforth, Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 1995; p.34
21. Hate Speech in the Balkans, International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights, Athens, 1998; p.55-56
22. Macedonia and Greece - The Struggle to Define a New Balkan Nation, John Shea, McFarland and Company Inc., North Carolina, 1997; p.91
23. Greek Monitor of Human and Minority Rights, Minority Rights Group and Greek Helsinki Monitor, Volume 1, No. 3, 1995; p.49
24. The World Almanac and Book of Facts 1994, Funk and Wagnalls Corporation, New Jersey, 1994; p.767
25. Simon McIlwaine, The Strange Case of the Invisible Minorities - Institutional Racism in the Greek State, International Society for Human Rights, British Section, Dec. 1993
26. Balkan Neighbours, Access Association, Sofia, 1997; p.41
27. The Sunday Telegraph, London, March 27, 1994
28. Dr. Alexander Zaharopoulos, "Greece - A Land of Heroes and Distortions", Sydney Morning Herald, March 23, 1994; p.15
29. A History of Later Greece - Turkish Rule [Istoria tis Neoteras Eladas - Turkokratia, I, 20 - os Eonas], Ioannis Kordatos, Athens, 1957
30. The Close Racial Kinship Between the Greeks, Bulgarians, and Turks, Dr. George Nakratzas, Preface to the Third Edition, 1999
31. Ibid.
32. Greek Monitor of Human and Minority Rights, Minority Rights Group and Greek Helsinki Monitor, Volume 1, No. 3, 1995; p.55

So you want to ban me why you affffraid from only one Macedonian in this forum.

You can translate please what is written here or it's better to translate me and you just conffirm and say again that it's propaganda.

Sign uttering a death threat against a member of RAINBOW

"RAINBOW party" has been painted over and -- "Death to the 'Skopian Gyspies' " -- has been written around it. "Skopian" is a vulgar Greek reference for Macedonian. Its use has been encourage by authorities including government ministers and the clergy.

This was written only against 5000 Macedonians or they are maybe 2 millions how we can know that without a register from FOPOG's Goverment.

Cornellia

It would actually seem to be ok to post Macedonian history on this board.  The name would hint otherwise, but the description tells us so:

I will control my nerves and not dignify this libel with an answer.

Those of you who are interested in the matter, can search for themselves in international Human Rights watchdog organizations' sites for Greece. Eg. the Amnesty International report on Greece (while you're there, check your country as well, you might be surprised): http://web.amnesty.org/library/eng-grc/index 

I'll move this thread to "intellectual Discussions"

Macedonian, you're walking on very thin ice... watch you language.

Well technically, it's already been reunited since WW1, but after WW2 it lost most of its historic territories to the East. I understand about giving territories to Lithuania, because it was part of Poland. But I think giving Lviv/Lwow to Ukraine was a big mistake. It's undeniable that it should belong to Poland, it has nearly always belonged to Poland, until the partitions. And it's not like the Ukraine needs it, the country is already bigger than Poland. Most of the territories lost to Poland after WW2, were just to make the neighbouring emerging states have a faster building and better economy. For example, they gave a bit of territory majoritarily inhabited by Polish people to the Czech republic, just because in that territory there was a strong mining industry. Today, Poland is feeling the effect of this mistake (my opinion) with it's "highest unemployment rate" in Europe.

Also, it is the same case for Belarus, Slovakia and Ukraine. They received those territories because of its important industries. Also, why give a piece of territory North of Poland to Russia. It is obvious that ethnically it didn't belong to Russia nor historically. I say it should have been given to Lithuania, if Poland wouldn't have been the first contender.

Another remark that I'd like to make is that why they didn't just give more Russian territory to Belarus and Ukraine instead of Polish territory.

PS: This is not propaganda, this is just my opinion.