Greece - The Bully of the Balkans

By Risto Stefov

rstefov@hotmail.com
The more Macedonians strive to assert their Macedonian identity the harder the Greek State and the Greek media try to negate it.
Macedonians have been agonizing for years looking for ways to break the impasse Greece has created. Macedonians would rather do more important things, than waste time fighting Greece on non-essential issues. Unfortunately, Greece has drawn the Macedonians into a battle which they must fight for the survival of their identity.
The Greek Government, by refusing to acknowledge the existence of the Macedonian people and by neglecting to inform its own people of the truth about Macedonia, has created an unfortunate problem for both sides from which neither can escape.
I am writing this article in response to the story "Skopyians provoke the omogeneia in Australia" which appeared on the website "Voice of Greece" at http://www.voiceofgreece.gr/ on October 16, 2005 [1].
What is strikingly strange about this story is its take on the original article. The authors seem to be reading a lot more into it than there really is and at the same time they are being blind and deaf to what the article is really trying to say.
Take for instance the title "Recovering Macedonia, Expiration of the Bucharest Treaty of 1913". Clearly the title says "Recovering Macedonia" so why are the Greek media authors calling it "We will take over Macedonia"? (http://www.greekcity.com.au/content/content.cfm?id=1596). See also (http://www.voiceofgreece.gr/en/Omogeneia_Main_News.asp?id=11867)
Readers are encouraged to read the original document "Recovering Macedonia" at: http://www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov78.html and decide for themselves what it says and compare that to what the Greek media says about it [1].
Clearly "Recovering Macedonia" has nothing to do with "taking over Macedonia". Recovering Macedonia is about the Macedonian question, about the Macedonian nation and its struggle to recover its place in this world. Recovering Macedonia is about gaining human rights for the Macedonian minorities in Greece, Bulgaria and Albania. It is about recovering our dignity as a people and as a nation. It is about recovering our properties that were confiscated by the Greek State.
Those who wrote the article are not "Skopyans" as the Greek media makes them out to be, they are simply Macedonians. They are Macedonians from Greece, a people that has been abused and neglected by the Greek State since 1912. They are tired of being an invisible minority without even the most basic human rights and want to bring change.
Why has the Greek media taken "Recovering Macedonia", something honourable like "striving for human rights", and twisted it into something violent like we will take your Macedonia?
Do the Greek State and Greek media truly believe that the "Skopyans", a handful of people with a small army and practically no economy, can take on Greece, a NATO member five times its size?
Why is the Greek media attempting to deceive the world, especially its own people, into believing that "Skopyans" are "really" dangerous?
If the Greek Government and the Greek media truly believe that the "Skopyans" are capable of such a feat, why don't they enlighten us? Show us how? I am sure we and many others would be interested to know.
Is the Greek State really afraid of the "Skopyans" or is this another ruse to sidestep the real issue, the cover-up of the existence of the Macedonian minority living inside Greece which the Greek Government refuses to recognize?
Unfortunately the Greek media once again has proven to be unreliable. The Greek media, which kowtows to the Greek Government on matters regarding Macedonia, will do anything, even lie to push the political agenda and continue to deny the existence of Macedonians living inside Greece.
We also have a message for "the other mediums" (you know who you are) who prefer to "copy" Greek articles and present them as "facts" without even bothering to check sources. Where is the integrity in that? Has the media become so complacent with the status-quo that it no longer cares for the truth? If you wish to maintain any shred of integrity please read the two articles; http://www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov78.html and (http://www.greekcity.com.au/content/content.cfm?id=1596 and make an informed decision based on facts not on what the Greek media says.
For those of you who continue to support the Greek stand with regard to the Macedonians of Greece, allow us to summarize for you what the Greek State has done for them in the past;
1. The Greek State unleashed its army in Macedonia in 1912 causing untold damage; burning villages, killing civilians, murdering and raping women and children and evicting people from their homes. See:
http://www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov61.htmlhttp://www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov64.htmlhttp://www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov67.html http://www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov72.html http://www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov76.html http://www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov80.html
2. After Macedonia's partition in 1913 (between Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria), Greece evicted at least fifty-thousand Macedonians from their homes simply because they refused to pledge loyalty to the Greek State. Greece gave them 24 hours to take whatever they could carry on their backs and get out. They were told, "This is Greece now and there is no room for the likes of you here!" Their properties were confiscated.
3. During the 1920's the Greek State evicted half a million Muslims, most of whom were ethnic Macedonians, and imported more than a million Christians Turks from Asia Minor, depositing most of them on Macedonian lands and awarding them confiscated properties belonging to the evicted Macedonians. With the evictions and the addition of the newcomers to the Macedonian demography, the indigenous Macedonian population became a minority on its native soil.
4. To eradicate and extinguish everything that was Macedonian, the Greek State, after occupying and annexing 51% of Macedonia's territory, named its portion the "New Territories" and later renamed it "Northern Greece". Starting in the 1920's the Greek State initiated a denationalization and forced assimilation program effectively renaming all Macedonian toponyms to Greek sounding ones, all peoples' given and surnames to Greek sounding ones and banning the Macedonian language from use, making it illegal. Adults were forced to go to night school and learn to speak Greek. Pre-kindergarten children were separated from their mothers and sent to school to learn Greek in order to prevent them from learning to speak Macedonian from their mothers.
5. To eradicate all historic evidence of a Macedonian existence in the Greek occupied territory of Macedonia, the Greek State initiated a program that removed all Macedonian inscriptions from municipal buildings churches, gravestones, church icons and whatever else existed.
6. During the Metaxas years the Macedonian language was forbidden to be spoken even in the privacy of one's home. People caught speaking Macedonian were beaten, given a hefty dose of castor oil, fined and imprisoned. Greek prisons and prison camps were crowded with Macedonians, especially old men and women who could not speak a word of Greek.
7. During the Greek Civil War many thousands of Macedonians were evicted from their homes and had their properties confiscated. Tens of thousands of civilians and refugee children were expelled from Greece and are still not allowed to return.
8. Since Macedonia's invasion, occupation and partition in 1912, 1913 successive Greek Governments have tried everything to extinguish all that was Macedonian so that they could claim "Macedonians don't exist".
In 1988 when it became inevitable that a new Macedonian State was about to be declared, from the breakup of the Yugoslav federation, the word "Macedonia" became very popular in Greece.
After attempting to extinguish the name for seventy-six years, the Greek State reversed its policy and made Macedonia a very popular word in the Greek vocabulary. It even renamed its northern province to Macedonia, claiming for historical reasons it was the only legitimate Macedonia and belonged to Greece.
Also after all the years of claiming that only Greeks lived in Macedonia, Greek authorities almost overnight "invented" a new ethnicity called "Greek Macedonians". This new ethnicity it appears is Macedonian but of Greek origin, descendents from the ancient Macedonians and rightful heirs to the Macedonian heritage.
How convenient!
We the Macedonians from Greece, including those living in the Diaspora who have been evicted from Greece, have had enough of Greek State inventions, denials and cover-ups about Macedonia and about the Macedonian identity. We therefore demand that the Greek Government (a) inform the Greek public of the truth about Macedonia and the Macedonian people and (b) recognize the Macedonian minority living in Greece.
We also appeal to the democratic people of Greece to join us in our struggle for human rights and for a peaceful coexistence between Macedonians and Greeks in a future Europe.
NOTES:
1. The following article was taken from the website "Vice of Greece"at http://www.voiceofgreece.gr/
Skopyians provoke the omogeneia in Australia.
16 Oct 2005 10:46:00
The last issue of "Australian Macedonian Weekly" ( Slavomacedonian newspaper in Australia) carries a Skopyian autonomists' map indicating that their Macedonia extends to Larissa under the title "We will take over Macedonia" and the subtitle "After the expiration of the Bucharest treaty".
The article, signed by Risto Stefov, invites the "Macedonians of the Diaspora" to begin a struggle for the reunification of Macedonia and the restitution of human rights of "Macedonians" who live in Greece and Bulgaria.
The article characteristically says that a large part of Macedonia is under Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia's occupation within the frame of "1913 Bucharest Treaty", which expires in 2012, and calls on all Macedonians to unite for the reunification of their country.
In the first part of the two page article, Greece and Bulgaria are mainly accused of illegally occupying Macedonia and oppressing Macedonians who live in their territory, claiming that there are not Macedonians. The journalist does not stop with the expression of absurd allegations but goes on to demand all those who committed crimes against Macedonians to be taken to justice.