Του Γιώργου Ν. Παπαδάκη
Καθώς οι γραμμές αυτές γράφονται γιορτινές μέρες, είχα αρχικά σκοπό να αναφερθώ σε κάτι πιο ήπιο, πιο ευχάριστο, πιο «εορταστικό» αν θέλετε…
Μετά από την Δεκεμβριανή μαυρίλα στην Ελλάδα, νομίζω ότι είχαμε όλοι ανάγκη να πιστέψουμε ότι δεν είναι όλα τόσο σκοτεινά γύρω μας.
Δυστυχώς, και να θέλει κάποιος να «αγιάσει», που λέει ο λόγος, δεν τον αφήνουν τα γεγονότα. Είμαι σίγουρος ότι στα ελληνικά ΜΜΕ πέρασε στα πολύ ψιλά γράμματα (αν εμφανίστηκε και πουθενά) η είδηση ότι το 6ο κανάλι της κρατικής τουρκικής τηλεόρασης TRT θα εκπέμπει από την 1η Ιανουαρίου πρόγραμμα ΑΠΟΚΛΕΙΣΤΙΚΆ στην κουρδική γλώσσα.
Σε ποια γλώσσα είπατε; Στην κουρδική; Η κρατική τουρκική τηλεόραση; Μα οι Τούρκοι δεν ήταν αυτοί που μέχρι πριν λίγο καιρό έλεγαν επίσημα σε όλα τα διεθνή fora ότι δεν υπάρχουν Κούρδοι αλλά μόνο «ορεσίβιοι Τούρκοι»;
Η απάντηση σε όλα αυτά τα ερωτήματα είναι καταφατική. Όμως οι καιροί αλλάζουν, και μάλιστα τόσο γρήγορα που ενίοτε νιώθουμε ότι δεν προλαβαίνουμε καν να παρακολουθήσουμε τις εξελίξεις. Μέσα σε ελάχιστο χρόνο, η κουρδική γλώσσα της ανυπαρξίας, της ολικής απαγόρευσης και της καταστολής μπήκε στα σπίτια των Τούρκων- Κούρδων και μη- αρχικά μέσω της μουσικής και στη συνέχεια μέσω της δορυφορικής τηλεόρασης. Το Roj TV είναι ένα δορυφορικό κανάλι ελεύθερης λήψης με έδρα τη Δανία που εκπέμπει όχι σε μια αλλά σε 4(!) διαλέκτους της «ανύπαρκτης» κουρδικής, καθώς και στα τουρκικά, τα περσικά, τα αγγλικά και τα αραβικά.
Η τρομακτική του απήχηση στους Κούρδους της Τουρκίας και όχι μόνο, «ανάγκασε» ουσιαστικά την TRT να αντιδράσει. Δειλά –δειλά, πριν 3,5 χρόνια εμφανίστηκαν τα πρώτα προγράμματα στα κουρδικά από την κρατική τηλεόραση για να φτάσουμε σήμερα να υπάρχει ένα ολόκληρο κανάλι αποκλειστικά γι’ αυτά.
Θα μου πείτε- και πιθανόν θα έχετε και δίκιο- ότι αν δεν υπήρχε το Roj TV και η γενικότερη χαλάρωση των απαγορεύσεων αναφορικά με τα κουρδικά από το 2002 και μετά, ίσως να μη βλέπαμε ποτέ αυτό το θέαμα.
Συμφωνώ. Είναι σαφές ότι ένας από τους λόγους που το τουρκικό κράτος αντιδρά φτιάχνοντας ένα κανάλι αποκλειστικά για Κούρδους, είναι και η προπαγάνδα. Ήδη, η συντριπτική πλειοψηφία των προγραμμάτων του καναλιού 6, αναφέρονται στον Ατατούρκ και στον αρχαίο τουρκικό πολιτισμό. Είναι εύλογο αυτό να συνεχιστεί και να εμπλουτιστεί και με νέα στοιχεία, ως «αντίβαρο» στο Roj TV που θεωρείται ότι –ως ένα σημείο- εκφράζει τις αρχές του ΡΚΚ.
Όμως, αυτό δεν είναι το κυρίαρχο θέμα εδώ. Η προσοχή μας θα πρέπει να εστιαστεί στο ότι μια «ανύπαρκτη» γλώσσα σε μια χώρα που παραμένει προβληματική στον τομέα των ανθρώπινων και μειονοτικών δικαιωμάτων, «νομιμοποιείται» με τον πλέον επίσημο τρόπο. Μέσω της κρατικής τηλεόρασης.
Για ελάτε τώρα να αντιπαραβάλουμε την Τουρκία με τη δική μας, «προηγμένη», «ευρωπαϊκή» και κυρίως «δημοκρατική» χώρα. Η οποία, όμως, παραμένει σταθερά ουραγός παρόμοιων εξελίξεων όχι μόνο σε ευρωπαϊκό αλλά και σε περιφερειακό, βαλκανικό επίπεδο. Και το χειρότερο είναι ότι δεν διαφαίνεται καμία διάθεση για αλλαγή στάσης, για προσαρμογή στις νέες συνθήκες. Εμείς έχουμε τη σχεδόν 100ετή συνθήκη της Λοζάννης ως ευαγγέλιο, τι να μας πουν τώρα όλοι αυτοί οι περιττοί νεωτερισμοί…
«Ανύπαρκτες» γλώσσες έχουμε δυστυχώς ή ευτυχώς και στην Ελλάδα. Είναι, νομίζω, σενάριο επιστημονικής φαντασίας ακόμα και το να σκεφτεί κανείς ότι στο ορατό μέλλον θα δούμε στην ΕΡΤ ένα έστω 15λεπτο πρόγραμμα π.χ. στα μακεδονικά.
Αλλά μήπως βλέπουμε πληθώρα προγραμμάτων και στις «υπαρκτές» γλώσσες, όπως τα τουρκικά; Τι αλήθεια γνωρίζει ο μέσος Έλληνας για τις μεγάλες γιορτές και τις θρησκευτικές παραδόσεις των μουσουλμάνων συμπατριωτών του; Ποια είναι η εξοικείωσή του με τις άλλες θρησκείες που υπάρχουν στη χώρα και-υποτίθεται ότι- είναι ισότιμες με την επίσημη; Και τι κάνει η κρατική ελληνική τηλεόραση για να μας φέρει έστω λίγο πιο κοντά στη διαφορετικότητα που ζει δίπλα μας;
Την απάντηση για όλα τα παραπάνω είναι και πάλι πολύ εύκολη και την γνωρίζουμε όλοι. ΤΙΠΟΤΑ.
Επί 52 εβδομάδες, κάθε Κυριακή, «βομβαρδιζόμαστε» τόσο από το 1ο όσο και από το 3ο κανάλι της κρατικής τηλεόρασης με την Ορθόδοξη Θεία Λειτουργία και τα τηλε- κηρύγματα ορισμένων έξαλλων γραφικών που ακολουθούν. Ούτε μια Κυριακή ή άλλη μέρα αφιερωμένη στους Καθολικούς, τους Εβραίους, τους Μουσουλμάνους, το Κουρμπάν Μπαιράμ, το Χάνουκα και τόσα άλλα…
Γιατί άραγε; Αυτοί οι άνθρωποι δεν πληρώνουν όπως όλοι οι Έλληνες κάθε μήνα την ΕΡΤ; Δεν πληρώνουν κανονικά τους φόρους τους;
Ασφαλώς και το κάνουν. Όπως το κάνουν και οι Μακεδονόφωνοι της Έδεσσας, οι Τουρκόφωνοι της Ξάνθης, οι Βλαχόφωνοι των Τρικάλων, οι Αρβανιτόφωνοι της Θήβας, οι Ρομά του Ασπρόπυργου. Και όμως εξακολουθούν να είναι «αόρατοι» και «ανύπαρκτοι» σε μια χώρα που θέλει να λέγεται σύγχρονη ευρωπαϊκή δημοκρατία και η οποία σε όλες τις εκκλήσεις για διάλογο από όλους αυτούς τους ανθρώπους απαντά με δυσφήμιση και δικαστήρια. Ίσως γιατί πλέον μας τελείωσαν τα Μακρονήσια και τα Γιούρα.
Ε, ας μην είμαστε και αχάριστοι, ας μην τα θέλουμε όλα δικά μας. Κι αυτό (η κατάργηση δηλαδή των τόπων εξορίας) είναι μια πρόοδος, διάβολε…
Όλο και κάτι θα αλλάξει προς το καλύτερο τα επόμενα 100 χρόνια. Επειδή όμως εσείς κι εγώ δεν θα είμαστε εδώ για να το δούμε, τουλάχιστον ξέρετε πλέον τι θα απαντάτε στον επόμενο που θα σας πει για την «καθυστερημένη» και «βάρβαρη» Τουρκία. Για την «θρασύτατη» και «προκλητική» Μακεδονία με μια κρατική τηλεόραση που δεν έχει χρήματα για να πληρώσει μισθούς αλλά συνεχίζει να μεταδίδει πρόγραμμα σε 7 γλώσσες, την «υπανάπτυκτη» και «βρώμικη» Αλβανία με τα 4 μειονοτικά τηλεοπτικά προγράμματα και τους άλλους Βαλκάνιους γείτονες που μας κάνουν να κοκκινίζουμε ντροπιασμένοι.
Αν βέβαια θυμόμαστε πια τι είναι ντροπή…
Καλή Χρονιά.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Greece finds cheap real estate for a monument
Greece will build a monument honoring the Macedonian warrior-king Alexander the Great at an ancient battlefield in southern Iraq.
Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyannis said the agreement was reached at the talks in Athens with Iraqi FM Hoshyar Zebari.
Zebari said the battlefield monument would underline the interaction of civilizations in the region.
Paying an honor to the great conquest "must symbolize the mutual influence between the two peoples," the Greek and the Iraqi ones, Bakoyannis said.
The monument will be built at the locality bearing the ancient name of Gaugamela, situated near the city of Mosul. At the time - 331 B.C. - Iraq was part of the Persian Empire, which stretched throughout most of the Middle East. 25-year-old Alexander won a crushing victory over a Persian army and declared himself Emperor of Asia. //01.27.09 //MINA
Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyannis said the agreement was reached at the talks in Athens with Iraqi FM Hoshyar Zebari.
Zebari said the battlefield monument would underline the interaction of civilizations in the region.
Paying an honor to the great conquest "must symbolize the mutual influence between the two peoples," the Greek and the Iraqi ones, Bakoyannis said.
The monument will be built at the locality bearing the ancient name of Gaugamela, situated near the city of Mosul. At the time - 331 B.C. - Iraq was part of the Persian Empire, which stretched throughout most of the Middle East. 25-year-old Alexander won a crushing victory over a Persian army and declared himself Emperor of Asia. //01.27.09 //MINA
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Modern Greece and the Macedonian Heritage – Part 4 - Why Greece and not Arvanitovlachia?
Risto Stefov
January 25, 2009
"This unique nation-state [Greece] would represent the ultimate achievement of the Hellenic ideal and, as such, would lead all Europe to the highest levels of culture yet known." (Michael Herzfeld)
In parts 2 and 3 of this series we established that prior to and during the creation of the Greek state in the early 1800´s the majority of the population living on Greek lands was predominantly immigrant, mostly of Albanian, Vlach and Slav origins, which had settled in Greece to fill the void created by the disappearance of the so-called ancient Greeks. This leads us to the question "Why was this region not called ´Arvanitovlachia´ which would have correctly represented the land´s demography? Why Greece, a Latin name, and not Arvanitovlachia an appropriate name to represent the two distinct ethnic identities which lived on those lands at that time?"
Although a difficult question to answer, in view of the Modern Greeks who have for the last 200 years tried to bury all evidence of their true past, the best response would be to say that ´the people living in Greece at the time of their independence were not given a choice to self identify´. When Greece was first created in the early 1800´s the population was neither asked nor involved in any kind of self-identification. Unlike the Macedonian people who in 1991 participated in a free referendum which enabled them to self identify and gain independence, the people of Greece were not given that choice! In essence the decision to call the newly created state "Greece" solely rested with foreigners and academics who, instead of calling the new state by its true representative demographic, opted for calling it "Greece" so that they could connect it with a world and culture that had died more than 2,000 years before.
In this article we are going to discover the reasons why Greece was named Greece and not Arvanitovlachia or some other name that would have appropriately connected the land with the current people.
We so readily use the word "Ancient Greece" and "Ancient Greeks" to refer to a place and a people in the classical period (about 600 BC to 300 BC) without realizing that the terms "Greece" and "Greeks" are of Latin origin which probably came into use sometime after the 1st century BC and were popularized during the 19th century.
The reason I mention this is because today Greece, without any justification, objects to the Macedonian peoples´ use of the name Macedonia to refer to their country on the grounds that the name "Macedonia", for historic reasons, belongs to the Greeks. To which Greeks does the name "Macedonia" belong? Is it to the so-called Ancient Greeks whose very name is not only of non-Greek origin but given to those people by the Latins after they disappeared from the face of this earth? Or does the name "Macedonia" belong to the Arvanitovlachs, the immigrants who over the centuries came to live on those lands? Or does the name "Macedonia" belong to the modern imposters who go by the name of "Greeks"?
Why Greece and not Arvanitovlachia? To find the answers to this questions we will first look at segments of William St. Clair´s book, "That Greece Might Still Be Free" which appeared in my series of articles called "William St. Clair on 19th century Greece and the Modern Greeks", at;
http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/view/82531 and http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/view/82785)
According to St. Clair "To be Greek was to be a drunkard, a lecher, and, especially, a cheat."
But later by the seventeenth century, as more information was uncovered about a people who once lived on those lands, a new picture began to emerge. In time Europeans, without ever having been to Greece, came to believe that the Ancient and Modern Greeks were one and the same. As more information came out, especially after Lord Byron visited Greece in 1809 and 1810, and, on his return, published the first two cantos of Childe Harold´s Pilgrimage, the legend of a place called "Ancient Greece" and a people called "Ancient Greeks" began to grow and spread like wildfire. Besides experiencing Greece for himself, Byron had also read and drew on the many travel books in the works of dozens of earlier writers in prose and in verse which helped him compose some of his best work described as best-sellers. At least twelve editions of his poem were printed between 1812 and 1821 and it was translated into several European languages.
Byron´s work prompted more travelers to visit "Greece" but very few were equipped to make more than superficial observations. That, however, did not stop them from making generalizations and expanding the myth surrounding these so-called "Greeks". As the idea of a "Greece" and "Greeks" grew it was romanticized by more and more writers. Many without ever having visited "Greece" shamelessly drew on the work of others and raised this mythical "Greece" into legendary status.
By 1770 the legend became so real that the few writers who questioned it were dismissed as cranks.
Again according to St. Clair, "With the advent of Byron, literary philhellenism became a widespread European movement. Hosts of imitators copied his rhetorical verses, and travelers who visited Greece after the appearance of Childe Harold in 1812 were even more enthusiastic than their predecessors.
By the time of the Greek Revolution in 1821 the educated public in Europe had been deeply immersed in three attractive ideas;
1. that Ancient Greece had been a paradise inhabited by supermen;
2. that the Modern Greeks were the true descendants of the Ancient Greeks; and
3. that a war against the Turks could somehow ´regenerate´ the Modern Greeks and restore the former glories."
So even before the so-called "Modern Greeks" had a chance to discover who they truly were and to decide what to call themselves and their little country, the outside world had made that decision for them. They were going to be called "Greeks", the embodiment of the "Ancient Greeks" and their little country was going to be called "Greece".
Not everyone however believed in these ideas but in Western Europe where philhellenism flourished the deed was done. But as St. Clair tells us, "The responsibility for turning philhellenism into a political programme belongs to the Greeks themselves.
The impetus came from the Greeks overseas."
By late eighteenth century colonies of people who came from the region that later became known as "Greece" and settled in Europe had become largely integrated into Western European culture. It was these people who naturally embraced the literary tradition of philhellenism and later built on it.
As Michael Herzfeld in his book "Ours Once More: Folklore, Ideology, and the making of Modern Greece" on pages 4 and 5 tells us: "By the nineteenth century, Classical scholars had come to pride themselves on a remarkable degree of academic perfectionism, but their views were clearly as much a matter of intellectual fashion as ever. A frankly critical American observer of nineteenth-century European scholarship decried not only the English scholars' ´limp Grecism,´ as evidenced in the excessively ´scented, wholesale sweetness of the modern aesthetic school in England,´ but also the Germans' use of Greek' ´as a stalking-horse for Teutonic psychology´ and their grave concern with minutiae. Scholars of the two nations resembled each other, he thought, ´in but a single trait–the conviction that they understand Greece´ (Chapman 1915: 12-13). Nor was this acid commentator entirely free of any such conviction about himself, to judge from the tone of these remarks. And so, presumably, it will go on. New truths will yield to still newer truths about the same basic idea, the vision of Classical Greece–the source, in a commonly held view, of the very practice of historical writing itself.
Such changes in perception are of interest here for two reasons. First, they show that through all the divergent interpretations there runs a common theme: the idea of Hellas as the cultural exemplar of Europe. And, second, these same contrasts mark the progressive enhancement of that exemplar's authority, not its dissolution (as we might expect) in the bickering of the ages. Whatever Greece is or was, the idea of Greece–like any symbol–could carry a wide range of possible meanings, and so it survived triumphantly. Similarly, the concept of European culture, so stable at the level of mere generality, has undergone many transformations through the centuries. ´Europe,´ like ´Hellas,´ was a generalized ideal, a symbol of cultural superiority which could and did survive innumerable changes in the moral and political order. It was to this European ideal, moreover, that Hellas was considered ancestral. Such is the malleable material of which ideologies are made."
What the Europeans saw in Greece they saw in themselves and as David Holden puts it "philhellenism is a love affair with a dream which envisions ´Greece´ and the ´Greeks´ not as an actual place or real people but as a symbol of some imagined perfection." Whatever Greece is or was, the idea of Greece–like any symbol–could carry a wide range of possible meanings, ´Europe,´ like ´Hellas,´ was a generalized ideal, a symbol of cultural superiority. Europe needed a genuine noble European past, a source for its enlightenment and it found it in a mythical Greece, a Greece of its own creation.
On page 5 of his book Michael Herzfeld goes on to say: "It is as an ideological phenomenon that we shall treat the twin concepts of Hellas and Europe here. They provided the motivating rationale for one of the most explosive political adventures of the nineteenth century, an adventure which claimed thousands of lives and brought many more under the control of a nation-state that had never before existed as a sovereign entity. This adventure was the Greek struggle for independence of 1821 to 1833. Its eventual success was by no means certain in the early stages. The Great Powers were reluctant to commit themselves to the Greek cause until, forced by public opinion at home, by the Greeks' own successes, and by the fear of each other's intentions, they began to take a more active part in bringing the Greek State into existence. That the Greeks did eventually prevail, despite the enormous Turkish armies with which they had to contend as well as their destructive internal squabbles, is some measure of the evocative power of the name of Hellas among their European supporters. To be a European was, in ideological terms, to be a Hellene.
Yet the Hellas which European intellectuals wished to reconstitute on Greek soil was very different from the Greek culture which they actually encountered there, despite all the western-educated Greek intellectuals' efforts to bridge the gap."
If I interpret Herzfeld correctly, not only did Europeans invent and mold the concept of a "Greece" and "Hellenism" but by their instigation of the so-called "Greek Struggle for Independence", with assistance from the Great Powers, they created a country where one never existed before! Yes you read it right! The Europeans instigated the so-called "Greek Struggle for Independence" in order to bring back the mythical "Ancient Greeks"! Further, they helped create a country based on a myth and shaped the character of its population on a culture that had died more than 2,000 years ago. And all this at the expense of the real, living and vibrant cultures that lived and coexisted on those lands for centuries. This reminds me of what the Greeks did in Macedonia nine decades later when they invaded, occupied, annexed Macedonia, destroyed its living and vibrant culture and turned the Macedonian people into mythical Greeks!
Why Greece and not Arvanitovlachia? Because the Europeans, aliens to the so-called Greek lands, took it upon themselves to reshape the new country and its people into something artificial to suit their own desires. Which begs the question "Why did the Europeans need a Greece and how did the birth of Greece shape Europe?" a subject for my next article.
Why give "Greece" a Latin name? The obvious answer is because the "concept" of a Greece was invented by the Modern Latins even before the "country" Greece came into existence. Since the Latins invented Greece it was appropriate that they give it a Latin name?
For those who are still not convinced that the Modern Greek identity is an artificial creation, please continue to read this series of articles.
Author´s note:
Dear Macedonians, one way to defend ourselves from the Greek onslaught and gain back our identity and dignity is to fight back to the level to which the Greeks have reduced us; that is to attack their identity as they have attacked ours. We need prove nothing to them except to expose them as the artificial identity they truly are and to uncover their design to wipe us out in order to usurp our Macedonian heritage.
To be Continued.
Many thanks to TrueMacedonian from www.maknews.com for his contribution to this article.
You can contact the author at rstefov@hotmail.com
Monday, January 26, 2009
Modern Greece and the Macedonian Heritage - Part 3 - Where did modern Greeks come from?
By Risto Stefov
rstefov@hotmail.com
January 18, 2009
In part 2 of this series we established that prior to and during the creation of the Greek state in the early 1800’s the majority of the population living on Greek lands was predominantly of Albanian, Vlach and Slav origin, which leads to the question “Where from and when did these Albanians, Vlachs and Slavs come to Greece and what happened to the indigenous population living on those lands?”
Modern Greeks claim that they are the descendents of the so-called Ancient Greeks. Is this fact or fiction?
We will begin the investigation with the “Popular Science Monthly” edited by J. McKeen Cattell, published in 1915. The Popular Science Monthly on page 41 reads: “Once Greece led the world in intellectual pursuits, in art, in poetry, in philosophy. A large and vital part of European culture is rooted directly in the language and thought of Athens. The most beautiful edifice in the world was the Peace Palace of the Parthenon, erected by Pericles, to celebrate the end of Greece’s suicidal wars. This endured 2,187 years to be wrecked at last (1687) in Turkish hands by the Christian bombs of the Venetian Republic.
But the glory of Greece had passed away long before the fall of the Parthenon. Its cause was the one cause of all such downfalls – the extinction of strong men by war. At the best, the civilization of Greece was built on slavery, one freeman to ten slaves. And when the freemen were destroyed, the slaves an original Mediterranean stock, overspread the territory of Hellas along with the Bulgarians, Albanians and Vlachs, barbarians crowding down from the north.”
So, what is the writer of the Popular Science Monthly from 1915 trying to tell us here? For one he or she is telling us that at the best of times; that would mean during the classics, Greece was predominantly populated by slaves and when the City States fell to the Romans the so-called ancient Greeks were numbering one freeman to ten slaves. So even before the turn of the new millennium the classical Greeks had vanished and were replaced by the slaves they once employed. Furthermore, the author is telling us that the glory of the so-called Ancient Greeks had passed away, died long before the Venetians occupied Greece in 1687. So where is the cultural and ancestral connection between the ancients and the moderns? Does it really exist?
Again looking at page 42 of the “Popular Science Monthly” we read: “It is maintained that the Modern Greeks are in the main the descendants of the population that inhabited Greece in the earlier of Byzantine rule. Owing to the operations of various causes, historical, social and economic, that population was composed of many heterogeneous elements and represented in very limited degree the race which repulsed the Persians and built the Parthenon. The internecine conflicts in the Greek community, wars with foreign powers, and the deadly struggles of factions in the various cities had to a large extent obliterated the old race of free citizens by the beginning of the Roman period. The extermination of the Plateans by the Spartans and of the Melians by the Athenians during the Peloponnesian wars, the proscription of the Athenian citizens after the war, the massacre of the Corcyrean oligarchs by the democratic party, the slaughter of the Thebans by Alexander and of the Corinthians by Mummius are among the more familiar instances of the catastrophe which overtook the civil element in the Greek cities. The void can only have been filled from the ranks of the metics and resident aliens and of the descendants of the far more numerous slave population. In the classic period four-fifths of the population of Attica were slaves; of the remainder half were metics. In AD 100 only three thousand arm-bearing men were in Greece. (James Bourchier)”
James Bourchier here reaffirms the fact that the so-called Ancient Greeks disappeared a long time ago and the void was filled by the numerous slaves they employed which at the time consisted of 80% of the total population.
Looking further down on page 42 of the “Popular Science Monthly” we read: “The constant little struggles of the Greeks among themselves made no great showing as to numbers compared to other wars, but they wiped out the most valuable people, the best blood the most promising heredity on earth. This cost the world more than the killing of millions of barbarians. In two centuries there were born under the shadow of the Parthenon more men of genius than the Roman Empire had in its whole existence. Yet this empire included all the civilized world, even Greece herself. (La Pouge)”
La Pouge here confirms what many others believed; the so-called Ancient Greeks were wiped out a long time ago.
At the bottom of page 42 of the “Popular Science Monthly” we read: “The downfall of Greece, like that of Rome, has been ascribed by Schultz to the crossing of the Greeks by the barbaric races which flocked into Hellas from every side. These resident aliens, or metics, steadily increased in numbers as the free Greeks disappeared. Selected slaves or helots were then made free in order to furnish fighting men, and again as these fell their places were taken by immigrants.”
Here again Schultz validates the fact that the so-called Ancient Greeks disappeared a long time ago and were replaced by aliens, slaves and immigrants. But who were these immigrants and where did they come from?
To get some answers to these questions we will examine the book “Customs and Lore of Modern Greece” by Rennell Rodd published in 1892. Rennell Rodd on page 17 writes: “Those who adopted the creed of their conquerors, in order to escape from these indignities, as did a large portion of the inhabitants of Euboea, and subsequently of Crete lost their national character, and, becoming Mussulman, practically ceased to be Greek; indeed, from the time of the Ottoman conquest the question of nationality is largely merged in the opposition of creeds. Sultan Mohammed II appears to have foreseen a safeguard against future insurrection in draining the resources of the country, and literally exhausting its population; and he re-peopled the vanquished Constantinople by transferring to the city the wealthiest inhabitants of the lands he subsequently reduced. Slavery awaited the Venetian subjects of Modon and Nauplia when they fell into his hands in 1463, and a similar fate befell a number of the natives of Euboea in 1470. The Ionian were called upon to yield their quota to the re-population of Constantinople, and a number of slaves were drawn from Rhodes in 1480. In the last year of the 15th century and the opening of the 16th, when the Morea was again the battle-field of Turk and Venetian, the occupants of the plains of Argos and of portions of Attica were practically exterminated, and Albanian colonists began to re-occupy the ruined lands. In the following century the Ottoman admiral, Barbarrosa, carried off the female inhabitants of Aegina into slavery, and massacred the males, leaving the island entirely depopulated until it was re-colonized by Albanians. He reduced the majority of the Aegean islands to subjection, expelled the Italian nobles and said to have carried off 30,000 Greeks into slavery.”
So what is Rennell Rodd telling us about the Modern Greeks and their true origins? Well, for one, he confirms what others are saying, that is, the original Greeks that inhabited the Greek islands and the mainland of Greece proper vanished a long time ago. Some converted to Islam and the rest were taken into slavery. He is also telling us that the vacant lands left behind were settled and colonized by Albanians.
It is interesting to note here that most of the Greek nobility was taken to Constantinople and no doubt Islamized to maintain loyalty. If that were the case and we have no reason to doubt it, then the question that begs to be asked is “Who is more Greek, the descendants of the Modern Turks of Constantinople or the Modern Greeks of Greece proper?” It makes one wonder!
According to Rennell Rodd however, one thing is certain and that is that there is very little that connects the Modern Greeks with the Ancient so-called Greeks and plenty of evidence that connects the Modern Greeks with the Albanians!
Let us see what else Rennell Rodd has to say. On pages 18 and 19 of his book “Customs and Lore of Modern Greece” published in 1892, Rennell Rodd goes on to say: “Meanwhile, the deserted lands were gradually occupied by Christian Albanians moving south before the wave of Turkish advance. Their earlier immigrants are lost in the silence of time, but the first recorded mention of their appearance in Peloponnesus occurs in the middle of the 14th century, when Manuel Kantacuzen brought Albanian mercenaries to Mistra, and later established colonies in the peninsula. Again, at the close of the 14th century in the reign of [Byzantine Emperor] John Paleologus, some 10,000 of them crossed the Isthmus, and in later days of the despots of the Morea they are found serving as mercenaries in their armies. The immigration continued through the 15th century, after the final reduction of Albania by the Turks. They occupied the greater part of Boetia, Attica and Megaris, portion of the Corinthian territory, of Argolis and Achaia, as well as small districts of in Phocis, Elis, and Archadia...”
Here again we find evidence of Albanians occupying deserted Greek lands as early as the 14th century. Even the Byzantine Emperors had a hand in re-colonizing Greece with Albanians. Then later during the Ottoman invasion of Albania we have even more Albanians invading and occupying Greek territories.
In view of what we have read so far, we can see a clear pattern developing which indicates without a doubt that as the so-called Ancient Greeks disappeared from Greek lands, they were replaced by predominantly Albanian immigrants who no doubt are the ancestors of today’s modern Greeks.
I use the reference “so-called Ancient Greeks” because as we earlier learned from “Popular Science Monthly” edited by J. McKeen Cattell, published in 1915, the Greek population that survived the Roman invasions and occupation were predominantly the Slaves of the Ancient Greeks. So when we make reference to the so-called Ancient Greeks in the 14th century AD, we are talking about the descendents of the Slaves who served the Ancient Greeks. So you see the so-called Greek lineage was already watered down even before the Slav, Vlach and Albanian migrations into Greek lands.
Speaking of Vlachs and Slavs, let us see what T. J. Winnifrith has to say? On page 119 in his book “The Vlachs The History of a Balkan People”, T. J. Winnifrith writes: “In the area where Vlachs as opposed to Romanians now live there is no shortage of reference to Vlachs after the breakdown of Byzantine authority. Choniates describing the Bulgarian revolt mentions a Vlach Chrysos setting up an independent principality in near Strumitsa and calls Thessaly ‘Great Vlachia’. [Byzantine Emperor] Andronicus I in an edict 1184 refers confusingly to Bulgars, Cumans and Vlachs in the Meglen with the Vlachs receiving preferential treatment. In 1221 the Bishop of Naupaktos, John Apokaukos, refers to the injuries suffered by Simeon Sgouropolos and his daughter at the hands of Avriolines Constantinos, a colonist of the Romans, whom people today call the Vlachs. This piece of evidence would seem to indicate a Vlach presence in Aetolia, especially as Constantinos with his Latin sounding first name (a corruption of Aurelian) had plenty of his race to support him. This evidence is sighted in an article by P. Nasturel which is a useful summary of Medieval Vlach history from the Romanian point of view. It is interesting that we have a definite indication that the Vlachs were seen as the descendants of the Romans, although it is just possible that Vlachs on the sea coast of Greece might be Dalmatian-speakers. Nasturel rather weakens his case by mentioning the people who call themselves Romans, cited by Constantine Porphyrogenitus, who are certainly Dalmatians and by drawing attention to the reference in about 1165 by the priest of Dioclea to Morlachs, black Latins, who used to call themselves Romans. This may be a reference to Dalmatians, although the etymology of Morlachs, from Mavrovlachoi shows a greater contact with Greece than most Dalmatians would have had, and we must not forget the fondness of Modern Vlachs for black clothes.”
On pages 120 and 121 in his book “The Vlachs The History of a Balkan People”, T. J. Winnifrith also writes: “As in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries when there was much Albanian activity at a time the Ottoman Empire was losing its authority, so in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries the breakdown of Byzantine authority lead to movements by both Vlachs and Albanians into Greece. These movements parallel earlier waves of invasions by Slavs on the breakdown of East Roman authority in the seventh century and by Dorians or north-western Greeks in the twelfth century B.C. after the collapse of the Mycenaean civilization. The details of all four movements of populations are obscure. There was bound to be much intermingling between races. Some Byzantine verses at the end of the fourteenth century describe Momicila a Bulgaralbanotovlachos, and slightly later we hear of one Boncoes a Serbalbanitovulgarovlachos. Modern polyglot Vlachs had polyglot ancestors.
Throughout the fourteenth century Vlachs are hard to distinguish from Albanians. The first mention of the Albanian language is not until 1285. According to John Kantakouzenos some people who lived in no town but inaccessible places in the mountains of Thessaly submitted in 1334 to the [Byzantine] Emperor Andronicus III. They were Albanians with no King, called after their tribal chiefs, Malakasaii, Bouii and Masaritae. But these were probably Vlachs; there were in Pouqueville’s time Vlachs in the Pindus who called themselves Bovi, and there is still a village called Malakasi. Elsewhere we hear of the Albanian leader Peter Leosas, leading Malakasii of his own race, and this would seem to suggest two kinds of Malakasii. The name may derive from the coastal plain of Malekastir, a word of Latin origin, in central Albania. The theory that the Bouii came from the nearby highland pasture of the Bevaei is more conjectural. Together with the Albanians the Vlachs penetrated to central and Southern Greece. We hear of Vlachs in Attica, Kephallenia and Crete, although in these instances and in the place names with Vlach elements which can be found as far south as the Peloponnesus there maybe confusions between Vlachs or shepherds and Albanians.”
Even though there is much too much detail for my purpose, I decided to include T. J. Winnifrith’s above two quotes for those who maybe interested in further pursuing this study. T. J. Winnifrith does however answer the question “Where from and when did these Albanians, Vlachs and Slavs come to Greece?” to a comfortable degree to reach another conclusion and that is not only are the Modern Greeks not the descendents of the Ancient Greeks but their origins can be traced in the Albanian and Vlach immigrants who were not even from Greece proper. So how does that make them the descendants of the Ancient Greeks? It does not!
After reading T. J. Winnifrith’s quotes above I am beginning to understand why Greeks throughout the Ottoman period right up to the time when Greece was created, correctly referred to themselves as “Romaoi” (Romans). Being partially the descendents of the Vlachs who in turn are the descendents of the Romans, naturally made them feel like Romans, thus their name “Romaoi”. This understood, then why did the Modern Greeks opt for being called “Greeks” and “Hellenes” and tied themselves to the Ancient Greek Heritage when they are not Greeks at all? A subject for my next article!
For those who are still not convinced that the Modern Greek identity is an artificial creation, please continue to read this series of articles.
Author’s note:
Dear Macedonians, one way to defend ourselves from the Greek onslaught and gain back our identity and dignity is to fight back to the level to which the Greeks have reduced us; that is to attack their identity as they have attacked ours. We need prove nothing to them except to expose them as the artificial identity they truly are and to uncover their design to wipe us out in order to usurp our Macedonian heritage.
To be Continued.
Many thanks to TrueMacedonian from www.maknews.com for his contribution to this article.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Greek journalist has been dismissed because used the neighboring state Republic of Macedonia just "Macedonia", in the greek Sunday newspaper REALNEWS
ΠΟΛΙΤΙΚΟ ΚΟΜΜΑ ΤΗΣ ΜΑΚΕΔΟΝΙΚΗΣ ΜΕΙΟΝΟΤΗΤΑΣ ΣΤΗΝ ΕΛΛΑΔΑ
Μέλος της Ευρωπαϊκής Ελεύθερης Συμμαχίας - Ευρωπαϊκό Πολιτικό Κόμμα (EFA-EPP)
Μέλος της Ομοσπονδιακής Ένωσης των Ευρωπαϊκών Εθνοτήτων (FUEN)
Στ. Δραγούμη 11 Φλώρινα/Lerin Τ.Κ. 53100; Τ.Θ. 51 Τηλ./fax 0030 23850 46548
www.florina.org; e-mail: rainbow@florina.org
Δελτίο Τύπου
Καμία έκπληξη, δυστυχώς, δεν προκάλεσε στην Ε.Ε.Σ- Ουράνιο Τόξο αλλά και σε ολόκληρη την κοινή γνώμη η αποπομπή συνεργάτη της εφημερίδας «Real News», επειδή υπέπεσε στο ολέθριο, ποινικά κολάσιμο και εγκληματικό σφάλμα να αποκαλέσει το βόρειο γείτονά μας «Μακεδονία», σε άρθρο που δημοσιεύτηκε στις 11 Ιανουαρίου
Φλώρινα/Lerin - 19 Ιανουαρίου 2009
Real News The scandal map
Καμία έκπληξη, δυστυχώς, δεν προκάλεσε στην Ε.Ε.Σ- Ουράνιο Τόξο αλλά και σε ολόκληρη την κοινή γνώμη η αποπομπή συνεργάτη της εφημερίδας «Real News», επειδή υπέπεσε στο ολέθριο, ποινικά κολάσιμο και εγκληματικό σφάλμα να αποκαλέσει το βόρειο γείτονά μας «Μακεδονία», σε άρθρο που δημοσιεύτηκε στις 11 Ιανουαρίου.
Καμία έκπληξη δε μας προκάλεσε το γεγονός ότι το «μοιραίο» περιστατικό ανακάλυψαν πρώτα, αφού είχαν ήδη περάσει 2 ημέρες, τα γνωστά εθνικιστικά σκουπιδό-blogs.
Καμία έκπληξη δε μας προκάλεσε η «ακαριαία» αντίδραση του μεγαλοδημοσιογράφου, μικροεκδότη, πολυεκατομμυριούχου παρουσιαστή, και «έντιμου» πατριώτη Νίκου Χατζηνικολάου, ο οποίος όχι μόνο απέλυσε τον (πιθανότατα χαμηλόμισθο και ανασφάλιστο) συνεργάτη της εφημερίδας του αλλά ζήτησε και ταπεινά συγνώμη.
Καμία έκπληξη δε μας προκάλεσε η σιωπή των ελληνικών Μέσων Μαζικής Διστρέβλωσης για το γεγονός.
Καμία έκπληξη δε μας προκάλεσε το αδιάφορο σφύριγμα της Ένωσης Συντακτών Ημερησίων Εφημερίδων Αθηνών, η οποία σε αντίστοιχες περιπτώσεις εργοδοτικής ασυδοσίας και απολύσεων, ξεσηκώνει το σύμπαν και διοργανώνει μέχρι και απεργιακές κινητοποίησεις. Είναι, άλλωστε, η ίδια Ένωση που έχει ως μέλη της έμμισθους υπαλληλους της ΕΥΠ και του ΥΠΕΞ και επαγγελματίες παραχαράκτες της αλήθειας.
Καμία έκπληξη δε μας προκάλεσε η σιγή ιχθύος όλων των Ελλήνων πολιτικών και ιδιαίτερα εκείνων που έχουν χρισθεί αυτόκλητοι προστάτες της «γενιάς των 700 ευρώ». Πιθανότατα διότι ο ατυχής που απολύθηκε αμοιβόταν με πολύ λιγότερα χρήματα.
Αλήθεια, θα τελειώσει ποτε αυτή η εθνικιστική νεοελληνική παράνοια που στην καλύτερη περίπτωση λοιδώρεί και συκοφαντεί ενώ στη χειρότερη εξοντώνει αμείλικτα κάθε τι το διαφορετικό σ’ αυτή τη χώρα;
Το Γραφείο Τύπου της Ε.Ε.Σ. – Ουράνιο Τόξο
RAINBOW participating in event organized by Human Rights Council, in United Nation. Forum on Minority Issues
January 15, 2009
Press Release
Pursuant to Human Rights Council resolution 6/15 of 28 September 2007, a forum on minority issues has been established. The forum will provide a platform for promoting dialogue and cooperation on issues pertaining to national or ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities, which shall provide thematic contributions and expertise to the work of the independent expert on minority issues. The Forum shall identify and analyze best practices, challenges, opportunities and initiatives for the further implementation of the Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities.
Press Release
Pursuant to Human Rights Council resolution 6/15 of 28 September 2007, a forum on minority issues has been established. The forum will provide a platform for promoting dialogue and cooperation on issues pertaining to national or ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities, which shall provide thematic contributions and expertise to the work of the independent expert on minority issues. The Forum shall identify and analyze best practices, challenges, opportunities and initiatives for the further implementation of the Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities.
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Karamanlis: Macedonia's road to EU, NATO sealed
Friday, 16.01.2009 | Macedonia
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In a strong-worded message to Macedonia, Greek Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis made it clear that the country's road to EU and NATO is sealed if no deal on the name row is reached.
Kathimerini daily says Karamanlis toned up his rhetoric in a speech before Greek parliament.
In a reply to rightist Laos party leader Yorgos Karadjaferis, Karajan's stressed that Skopje's Euro-Atlantic ambitions won't come true if the authorities care about political gain of upcoming elections instead of caring about the country's future.
Greek prime minister reiterated Athens' position that only a name with a geographic qualifier could pave the way to an ultimate deal
Friday, January 16, 2009
The Forced Homogenization of Populations in Greek Macedonia
Ordinarily I could care less what people call themselves, it's a personal issue how one wishes to present and even when I know people are lying about their ethnic heritage I let it slide. But, when today's self-proclaimed "Greeks" take it upon themselves to dictate to others how they may call themselves then it's time to speak up.
The Greek government routinely denies the existence of ethnic Macedonians, as it denies the existence of all ethnic and national minorities within its jurisdiction. Greece, you see, is a pure country with no minorities, a miracle in the modern World and unique in Europe - or so we are told.
In truth today's Modern Greek identity, the Greek identity of such luminaries as Kostas Karamanlis and Dora Bakoyannis, is the result of enforced homogenization. It is a political identity and historically artificial.
Prior to 1913 the majority of people living in geographic Macedonia shared common customs, traditions, songs, dances, language, history and religion. These people had lived in Macedonia for some 1500 years and their relationship is probably much older than that. Any decent person, any civilised human being would have no problem referring to such people as 'ethnic Macedonians'.
Now, let's consider the so-called "ethnic Greek" identity of today's Modern Greeks.
According to Webster's dictionary, belonging to an ethnic group means belonging to a division of mankind as distinguished by customs, characteristics, language and sharing a common history, etc.
I recently read an interesting article at in an official Turkish website:
http://www.mfa.gov.tr/denial-of-ethnic-identity.en.mfa
What do Turks have to say about today's Greeks? After all both Macedonia and Greece were ruled by Turkey for centuries; Greece for four centuries and Macedonia for five.
The site states:
" The [Modern] Greek Nation is based on the principle of belonging to the Greek race and the Greek Orthodox Church. On this subject, it is enough to glance at the speeches of Greek statesmen about the homogeneity of the Greek nation with the exception of the Muslim minority.
If today's Greek Nation is really homogeneous, one cannot help but wonder about the destiny of the Albanians, the Muslim Albanians, Vlach, Macedonians, Bulgarians, Jews as well as Turks. In this respect it becomes necessary to answer the question of how homogeneity has been achieved in Greek Macedonia while ethnic variety still survives in the Republic of Macedonia ."
What are the Turks talking about? Who are these Albanians, Vlach, Macedonians, Turks, etc. existing in Greece?
As mentioned above, Athens denies the existence of any national or ethnic minorities on its territory. Greece claims to be an ethnically homogeneous nation whose roots extend back to the ancient Greeks of thousands of years ago.
Such a claim is utter nonsense, of course, but this is the official mythology of the Modern Greek state. This is what today's Greeks are taught in school and this is the kind of historical fiction promoted by Greek society.
The Ottoman Turks were masters of Greece for four centuries, long before a Greek state was created and prior to the Romanoi altering their identity and referring to themselves "Greeks". There was indeed a great variety of ethnic populations in what is today Greece, but apparently they have all vanished.
The Turkish site puts it succinctly:
"In this respect, it becomes necessary to answer the question of how homogeneity has been achieved in Greek Macedonia while ethnic variety still survives in the Republic of Macedonia ?"
How indeed!
When the Greek kingdom was created in 1829, the following ethnic groups dominated the territory: Arvanites (Christian Albanians), Vlahi (Vlachs), Tourki (Turks), Voulgari (Bulgarians and Macedonians), Slavi (Macedonians), Slavo-Makedones (Macedonians), Endopii (indigenous Macedonians), Gifti (Roma), Evreii (Jews) and others. Some citations carelessly refer to those who spoke Greek as "Greeks" but such people more often than not belonged to one of the distinct non-Greek ethnic groups.
It is impossible to gauge to what extent ancient Greeks (including the huge slave populations) survived in the lower Balkans and preserved a 'Greek' identity for 2500 years. It is extremely unlikely that more than a miniscule fraction of today's "Greek" population has any connection whatsoever to the ancient Greeks. The vast bulk of today's "Greeks" have been recently made "Greek" as part of the political homogenization process.
European powers created the Greek kingdom in an effort to block Russian access to warm waters. At that time, in 1829, the Arvanites still spoke the Albanian language and had their own unique customs and traditions. This was the majority population in the region of Attica (Athens) so much so that there was discussion as to whether Greek or Albanian should become the official language of the new kingdom. The Vlach still spoke their mother Vlach language similar to Latin and they had their own unique customs and traditions. Turks spoke the Turkish language and had their own customs and traditions, etc.
Notwithstanding the many names Modern Greeks use to refer to Macedonians, e.g., Slavs, Slavofoni, diglossos, Voulgaros, Slavo-Makedones, Dopii and more recently the ignorant Skopianoi, Macedonians spoke the Macedonian language, which existed and still exists throughout all of geographic Macedonia. Macedonians too have their own unique customs and traditions, which are different from the other groups.
If the truth be told today's Greece is inhabited by diverse Ottoman Christian populations of various ethnic backgrounds. These people did not have a "Greek" ethnic identity, that identity was imposed on them later. It was only after the creation of the Greek kingdom that authorities fabricated a new "Greek" identity, the purpose being to homogenize the population.
Authorities systematically destroyed people's original ethnic identity. They made the declaration of any non-Greek identity socially repulsive and illegal. People became too ashamed to refer to themselves as Arvanites and Vlach. Even today you see Arvanites like former Greek foreign minister, Pangalos, denying his Albanian heritage and proclaiming himself a pure Hellene. That's quite pathetic but Modern Greeks are taught that any non-Greek identity is vulgar and inferior to the newly fabricated Greek identity. Modern Greeks have buried their true ethnic heritage, and where they still remember it, they have become self-loathing. This is what it means to be a modern-day "Hellene".
Greek authorities also taught the citizenry that it was "patriotic" to monitor one's neighbours and hand over to authorities the names of people who refused to identify as Greek and who continued to speak their non-Greek mother tongues. This process of spying on your neighbours and betraying them to authorities went on for generations and still goes on today, even in the Diaspora.
Politicians in Athens fabricated a state mythology, a fake history if you will, for these newly minted Greeks to share, the purpose being to bind the different ethnic groups together and unify the state.
Greece adopted Koine, which today is paraded as the Modern Greek language. But, just as the Modern Greek flag was stolen from the British East India Company, Koine, which many Greeks boast connects them to the ancients, was stolen from the Byzantine Church. Greece was fabricating its new history, identity and language in a hodgepodge manner via theft. In fact most of today's "Greek culture" is stolen from the various assimilated populations and misrepresented as "Greek".
People who learnt Koine are no more Greek nor related to the ancient Greeks than people who learnt hieroglyphs are Egyptian and related to the ancient Egyptians. Adopting a new language doesn't give one rights to the heritage of the ancient populations who spoke it.
It made sense to impose the church Koine as religion was the only thing the various ethnic groups of Greece had in common. But, religion is not ethnicity.
Greece changed the place names and people's personal names, renaming everyone and everything to make them appear Greek. This tells us that neither the places nor the people were Greek and they had to be made Greek by force. This is Greece's famous policy of ethnic and cultural genocide.
As a Macedonian from Aegean Macedonia my new (artificial) "Greek" history begins in 1926 after the Greek government changed my grandfather's name and the name of my village from Macedonian to Greek. There was no Stefou or Trigono before 1926 and everyone spoke Macedonian, not Greek.
If I am to believe that after 1926 I am Greek then I must ask: What was I before 1926? What was I before they changed our village name and our family name from Macedonian to Greek? What was the original ethnic heritage of my family?
And just what is it that makes today's citizens of Greece "ethnically Greek"? Just what is it that makes Greekocised Macedonians, Vlach, Arvanites, Roma, Turks, etc., share the same "ethnicity" in Greece?
According to Webster's dictionary a Greek is a native or modern inhabitant of Greece. So, anyone who lives in Greece is Greek by virtue of geography. One must assume that if such people move to a different location they would take on a new identity. That hardly sounds like an ethnic group.
The name Greek is derived from the word Graioi, originally the Latin name of a Boeotian tribe that settled in Southern Italy in the 8th century BC, but clearly the Boeotians did not give rise to today's Modern "Greeks". Use of the term "Greek" cannot, in itself, define an ethnicity. There must be more to it.
So, what makes today's Greeks "ethnic Greeks"?
It can't be culture, tradition or customs as the original cultures, traditions and customs of today's Greek population (Albanians, Vlachs, Macedonians, Turks, Roma, etc.) were distinct and non-Greek.
It can't be language since Koine was formally imposed on diverse groups only after the Greek kingdom was formed in 1829. Koine was not the mother tongue of people living in what became Greece, this was a church language just as Latin was the church language to the West.
So, it isn't language, culture, tradition or custom. It's not history either, as more than half of today's Greek population is not indigenous to the region and was only transplanted into the area from Asia Minor and the Black Sea over the last century. These are unrelated, historically disjoint populations.
You can see why the Greek government was under pressure to manufacture a language and identity for all these different groups. The only thing they shared, the only thing they had in common, was their religion.
Today's Modern Greek state is based on religion, not ethnicity or history. Historically, it is unrelated to ancient Greece. When the Bavarian royal house established the new Greek kingdom it was meant as a haven for the persecuted Christians of the Ottoman regions. The first Greek constitution beckoned to all Christians to immigrate and settle there - it did not beckon to "Greeks" to come and settle there.
Other than a common religion there is little if any of the characteristics of an "ethnic group" prior to the formation of the Greek kingdom in 1829.
That's why forced homogenization was necessary in the first place. That's why everything and everyone had to be renamed. That's why a new Greek language had to be imposed and people's mother tongues and ethnic identities had be suppressed and destroyed. That's why ethnic variety still exists in the Republic of Macedonia but has vanished from the new Greek state.
How is it, then, that people who only recently and just barely qualify to call themselves "ethnic Greeks" are allowed to usurp the ancient Greek heritage and the ancient Macedonian heritage? From what authority does this group attempt to tell ethnic Macedonians who they are and how they may call themselves?
Obviously today's Greeks are ethnic frauds, their identity is nothing more than the product of a government program. We indigenous Macedonians of Greece know this first hand as we have been resisting the ruthless ethnocide of Greece for a century now.
What is the Macedonian government doing negotiating our Macedonian identity and Macedonian ethnic heritage with such racists and frauds?
You can contact the author at rstefov@hotmail.com
The Greek government routinely denies the existence of ethnic Macedonians, as it denies the existence of all ethnic and national minorities within its jurisdiction. Greece, you see, is a pure country with no minorities, a miracle in the modern World and unique in Europe - or so we are told.
In truth today's Modern Greek identity, the Greek identity of such luminaries as Kostas Karamanlis and Dora Bakoyannis, is the result of enforced homogenization. It is a political identity and historically artificial.
Prior to 1913 the majority of people living in geographic Macedonia shared common customs, traditions, songs, dances, language, history and religion. These people had lived in Macedonia for some 1500 years and their relationship is probably much older than that. Any decent person, any civilised human being would have no problem referring to such people as 'ethnic Macedonians'.
Now, let's consider the so-called "ethnic Greek" identity of today's Modern Greeks.
According to Webster's dictionary, belonging to an ethnic group means belonging to a division of mankind as distinguished by customs, characteristics, language and sharing a common history, etc.
I recently read an interesting article at in an official Turkish website:
http://www.mfa.gov.tr/denial-of-ethnic-identity.en.mfa
What do Turks have to say about today's Greeks? After all both Macedonia and Greece were ruled by Turkey for centuries; Greece for four centuries and Macedonia for five.
The site states:
" The [Modern] Greek Nation is based on the principle of belonging to the Greek race and the Greek Orthodox Church. On this subject, it is enough to glance at the speeches of Greek statesmen about the homogeneity of the Greek nation with the exception of the Muslim minority.
If today's Greek Nation is really homogeneous, one cannot help but wonder about the destiny of the Albanians, the Muslim Albanians, Vlach, Macedonians, Bulgarians, Jews as well as Turks. In this respect it becomes necessary to answer the question of how homogeneity has been achieved in Greek Macedonia while ethnic variety still survives in the Republic of Macedonia ."
What are the Turks talking about? Who are these Albanians, Vlach, Macedonians, Turks, etc. existing in Greece?
As mentioned above, Athens denies the existence of any national or ethnic minorities on its territory. Greece claims to be an ethnically homogeneous nation whose roots extend back to the ancient Greeks of thousands of years ago.
Such a claim is utter nonsense, of course, but this is the official mythology of the Modern Greek state. This is what today's Greeks are taught in school and this is the kind of historical fiction promoted by Greek society.
The Ottoman Turks were masters of Greece for four centuries, long before a Greek state was created and prior to the Romanoi altering their identity and referring to themselves "Greeks". There was indeed a great variety of ethnic populations in what is today Greece, but apparently they have all vanished.
The Turkish site puts it succinctly:
"In this respect, it becomes necessary to answer the question of how homogeneity has been achieved in Greek Macedonia while ethnic variety still survives in the Republic of Macedonia ?"
How indeed!
When the Greek kingdom was created in 1829, the following ethnic groups dominated the territory: Arvanites (Christian Albanians), Vlahi (Vlachs), Tourki (Turks), Voulgari (Bulgarians and Macedonians), Slavi (Macedonians), Slavo-Makedones (Macedonians), Endopii (indigenous Macedonians), Gifti (Roma), Evreii (Jews) and others. Some citations carelessly refer to those who spoke Greek as "Greeks" but such people more often than not belonged to one of the distinct non-Greek ethnic groups.
It is impossible to gauge to what extent ancient Greeks (including the huge slave populations) survived in the lower Balkans and preserved a 'Greek' identity for 2500 years. It is extremely unlikely that more than a miniscule fraction of today's "Greek" population has any connection whatsoever to the ancient Greeks. The vast bulk of today's "Greeks" have been recently made "Greek" as part of the political homogenization process.
European powers created the Greek kingdom in an effort to block Russian access to warm waters. At that time, in 1829, the Arvanites still spoke the Albanian language and had their own unique customs and traditions. This was the majority population in the region of Attica (Athens) so much so that there was discussion as to whether Greek or Albanian should become the official language of the new kingdom. The Vlach still spoke their mother Vlach language similar to Latin and they had their own unique customs and traditions. Turks spoke the Turkish language and had their own customs and traditions, etc.
Notwithstanding the many names Modern Greeks use to refer to Macedonians, e.g., Slavs, Slavofoni, diglossos, Voulgaros, Slavo-Makedones, Dopii and more recently the ignorant Skopianoi, Macedonians spoke the Macedonian language, which existed and still exists throughout all of geographic Macedonia. Macedonians too have their own unique customs and traditions, which are different from the other groups.
If the truth be told today's Greece is inhabited by diverse Ottoman Christian populations of various ethnic backgrounds. These people did not have a "Greek" ethnic identity, that identity was imposed on them later. It was only after the creation of the Greek kingdom that authorities fabricated a new "Greek" identity, the purpose being to homogenize the population.
Authorities systematically destroyed people's original ethnic identity. They made the declaration of any non-Greek identity socially repulsive and illegal. People became too ashamed to refer to themselves as Arvanites and Vlach. Even today you see Arvanites like former Greek foreign minister, Pangalos, denying his Albanian heritage and proclaiming himself a pure Hellene. That's quite pathetic but Modern Greeks are taught that any non-Greek identity is vulgar and inferior to the newly fabricated Greek identity. Modern Greeks have buried their true ethnic heritage, and where they still remember it, they have become self-loathing. This is what it means to be a modern-day "Hellene".
Greek authorities also taught the citizenry that it was "patriotic" to monitor one's neighbours and hand over to authorities the names of people who refused to identify as Greek and who continued to speak their non-Greek mother tongues. This process of spying on your neighbours and betraying them to authorities went on for generations and still goes on today, even in the Diaspora.
Politicians in Athens fabricated a state mythology, a fake history if you will, for these newly minted Greeks to share, the purpose being to bind the different ethnic groups together and unify the state.
Greece adopted Koine, which today is paraded as the Modern Greek language. But, just as the Modern Greek flag was stolen from the British East India Company, Koine, which many Greeks boast connects them to the ancients, was stolen from the Byzantine Church. Greece was fabricating its new history, identity and language in a hodgepodge manner via theft. In fact most of today's "Greek culture" is stolen from the various assimilated populations and misrepresented as "Greek".
People who learnt Koine are no more Greek nor related to the ancient Greeks than people who learnt hieroglyphs are Egyptian and related to the ancient Egyptians. Adopting a new language doesn't give one rights to the heritage of the ancient populations who spoke it.
It made sense to impose the church Koine as religion was the only thing the various ethnic groups of Greece had in common. But, religion is not ethnicity.
Greece changed the place names and people's personal names, renaming everyone and everything to make them appear Greek. This tells us that neither the places nor the people were Greek and they had to be made Greek by force. This is Greece's famous policy of ethnic and cultural genocide.
As a Macedonian from Aegean Macedonia my new (artificial) "Greek" history begins in 1926 after the Greek government changed my grandfather's name and the name of my village from Macedonian to Greek. There was no Stefou or Trigono before 1926 and everyone spoke Macedonian, not Greek.
If I am to believe that after 1926 I am Greek then I must ask: What was I before 1926? What was I before they changed our village name and our family name from Macedonian to Greek? What was the original ethnic heritage of my family?
And just what is it that makes today's citizens of Greece "ethnically Greek"? Just what is it that makes Greekocised Macedonians, Vlach, Arvanites, Roma, Turks, etc., share the same "ethnicity" in Greece?
According to Webster's dictionary a Greek is a native or modern inhabitant of Greece. So, anyone who lives in Greece is Greek by virtue of geography. One must assume that if such people move to a different location they would take on a new identity. That hardly sounds like an ethnic group.
The name Greek is derived from the word Graioi, originally the Latin name of a Boeotian tribe that settled in Southern Italy in the 8th century BC, but clearly the Boeotians did not give rise to today's Modern "Greeks". Use of the term "Greek" cannot, in itself, define an ethnicity. There must be more to it.
So, what makes today's Greeks "ethnic Greeks"?
It can't be culture, tradition or customs as the original cultures, traditions and customs of today's Greek population (Albanians, Vlachs, Macedonians, Turks, Roma, etc.) were distinct and non-Greek.
It can't be language since Koine was formally imposed on diverse groups only after the Greek kingdom was formed in 1829. Koine was not the mother tongue of people living in what became Greece, this was a church language just as Latin was the church language to the West.
So, it isn't language, culture, tradition or custom. It's not history either, as more than half of today's Greek population is not indigenous to the region and was only transplanted into the area from Asia Minor and the Black Sea over the last century. These are unrelated, historically disjoint populations.
You can see why the Greek government was under pressure to manufacture a language and identity for all these different groups. The only thing they shared, the only thing they had in common, was their religion.
Today's Modern Greek state is based on religion, not ethnicity or history. Historically, it is unrelated to ancient Greece. When the Bavarian royal house established the new Greek kingdom it was meant as a haven for the persecuted Christians of the Ottoman regions. The first Greek constitution beckoned to all Christians to immigrate and settle there - it did not beckon to "Greeks" to come and settle there.
Other than a common religion there is little if any of the characteristics of an "ethnic group" prior to the formation of the Greek kingdom in 1829.
That's why forced homogenization was necessary in the first place. That's why everything and everyone had to be renamed. That's why a new Greek language had to be imposed and people's mother tongues and ethnic identities had be suppressed and destroyed. That's why ethnic variety still exists in the Republic of Macedonia but has vanished from the new Greek state.
How is it, then, that people who only recently and just barely qualify to call themselves "ethnic Greeks" are allowed to usurp the ancient Greek heritage and the ancient Macedonian heritage? From what authority does this group attempt to tell ethnic Macedonians who they are and how they may call themselves?
Obviously today's Greeks are ethnic frauds, their identity is nothing more than the product of a government program. We indigenous Macedonians of Greece know this first hand as we have been resisting the ruthless ethnocide of Greece for a century now.
What is the Macedonian government doing negotiating our Macedonian identity and Macedonian ethnic heritage with such racists and frauds?
You can contact the author at rstefov@hotmail.com
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Macedonia Protests Over Greek Minister Comments
Skopje has officially protested at the European Commission in Brussels over comments by the Greek Culture Minister that Macedonia will soon dissolve and be carved up between a 'Greater Albania' and a 'Greater Bulgaria'.
Macedonia’s mission in Brussels condemned the statements by Antonis Samaras as “counterproductive” for bilateral relations, and expressed concern that no one in Athens had denounced them yet, local A1 TV said.
Skopje and Athens have been locked in a dispute over Macedonia’s name for 18 years. In April last year Greece blocked Macedonia’s NATO invitation arguing that use of the name implies territorial claims over its own northern province that is also called Macedonia.
On Saturday the newly-appointed minister said in an interview for Greek national television ERT that the end of the dispute would come naturally as Macedonia -- which Greeks refer to as simply 'Skopje' - dissolves and is swallowed up by its neighbors.
“Time is on our side”, Samaras said. “I believe that Skopje will not survive as a single country and that Greece has nothing to fear from the creation of ‘Great Albania’ and ‘Great Bulgaria’.”
Samaras has long been a hardliner on the "Macedonian Question" and other Greek national issues, and was publicly behind the idea of an "Orthodox axis" in the Balkans during the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s.
Skopje warned that such statements could additionally get in the way of the next round of UN-sponsored talks, scheduled for February 11.
This is the fourth time Macedonia has launched an official protest against Greece in recent months. It has protested over Athens banning its national air carrier MAT from flying over Greece, over alleged police cruelty against ethnic Macedonians living in Greece and over the arrest of Macedonian journalists who tried to report on the event.
It has attracted criticism in turn over its decision to rename its main highway “Alexander of Macedon”, for the ancient conqueror whose origin is part of a dispute that has come to encompass history, geography and genetics.
(Reporting by Sinisa-Jakov Marusic)
The Contest For Macedonian Identity 1870-1912
Book Review by Risto Stefov
August 27, 2008
rstefov@hotmail.com
The book “The Contest For Macedonian Identity 1870-1912”, written by Nick Anastasovski and published by Pollitecon Publications is a scholarly publication which describes in detail ongoing attempts first by the Ottoman Empire then by Macedonia’s neighbours Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria to dominate Macedonia and control the Macedonian people. After colonizing Macedonia, the Muslim Ottoman Empire economically influenced many Macedonians to convert to Islam. Then when the Ottoman Empire fell apart Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria fought by any means possible to turn Macedonians into Greeks, Serbs and Bulgarians including the use of State-sponsored teachers, priests, and terrorism through armed interventions.
Nick Anastasovski in his book “The Contest For Macedonian Identity 1870-1912” carefully examines in detail the fierce competition between the various factions and shows how they fought at the political, religious, educational and day-to-day level. He analyzes numerous Ottoman, Greek, Bulgarian, Serbian, Macedonian and other sources and introduces new and original research which he conducted in the Bitola region, western Macedonia and other parts of ethnic and Ottoman Macedonia.
Besides offering historical and personal accounts of people and events that shaped Macedonia in the last two hundred years or so, Nick also provides maps, statistical and demographic charts from various sources, does his own comparative analysis and reaches his own conclusions.
The book is full of historical facts not only about Macedonia’s history but also about the Macedonian peoples’ culture, centuries old traditions and customs. Nick dedicates an entire chapter to Bitola in which, among other things, he describes the various customs and traditions observed in the region including those of marriage, the role of women in society and the home, religious celebrations, holidays, rain rituals and more. The customs and traditions may vary a little but equally apply to every corner of Macedonia. The tradition I liked best, which Nick describes in his book on page 263, is the Dudule. I have always been fascinated by the rain ritual performed during droughts especially by the lyrics in the various chants. The rain dance is not exclusive to Macedonia, it is a world phenomenon most popularized by the indigenous people of North America.
I also found a map on page 118, which I have been looking for. It is a map of the three Ottoman Macedonian Vilayetes of 1900. Did you know that Kosovo was part of the Skopje Vilayet and most of Albania was under the Vilayet of Bitola?
The book is subdivided into six chapters. Chapter one examines the colonization of Macedonia and the role religion played in the political and economic classification of people. Chapter two examines the inconsistencies and contradictions of ethnographic data on Macedonia. Chapter three outlines demographic data of the Bitola Region. This chapter also describes how political insecurity initiated by the rivalry of the Balkan States created general economic instability and gave rise to the emigration of temporary workers known as pechelbari. Chapter four provides an overview of the establishment and role of foreign religious organizations in Macedonia. Here the reader will not only learn about the role of the Patriarchate and Exarchate Churches but also about the role Western Churches played in Macedonia. Chapter five analyzes the impact of schools in both the Bitola rural environment as well as the urban center to determine what effects foreign education had on the Macedonian identity. Chapter six seeks to evaluate the impact of islamicisation upon identity, social structure and village rituals in the Dolna Reka, Debar Region.
By far the strongest of Nick’s abilities here is his understanding and presentation of the roles of each of the competitors vying for Macedonia and how each manipulated situations to gain an advantage over the others and particularly over the Macedonian people.
In his abstract he writes, “As a contested space Macedonia in the late nineteenth century suffered political, religious and paramilitary incursions made upon the population by the neighbouring nascent states and the disappearing Ottoman Empire. Territorial claims were rationalized by ethnographic maps and statistical population data. Interested commentators viewed Macedonia in accordance with government policy and presented their studies as academic and scientific, even though these studies were clearly political in nature. The European Powers maintained their own pretence and acted as patrons of the small Balkan States. Although churches, schools and paramilitary bands were the primary instruments of the Greek, Bulgarian and Serb states, expansion into Macedonia was ultimately achieved by a full military mobilization when the armies of Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia marched into Macedonia in October 1912 and drove out the Ottoman Turks. The territorial division of Macedonia and claims upon the Macedonians have continued to be a matter of contention between the Balkan States into contemporary times.”
In regards to population data compiled by non-Balkan Europeans supporting views of the respective Balkan States, on page 148 he writes: “Of primary importance to the European powers was Macedonia’s strategic geographical location. Since ancient times Macedonia had been a strategic stepping stone between east and west for invading armies and empires. In the late nineteenth-century Macedonia found herself the central focus of conflicting European power struggles. Russian and Austrian hopes for access to Solun had to be achieved via Serbian or Bulgarian territories, and Russia offered Macedonia to Serbia and Bulgaria from time to time in the course of negotiations. The English and French encouraged the idea of a greater Greece in order to forestall Russian and Austrian attempts to gain access to the Mediterranean. The imperialist designs of the European Powers took precedence over ethnographic questions and views based on Macedonia being a ‘territory of dispute’ were more in line with existing political agendas. There was no shortage of individuals willing to link their ethnographic findings to political positions. As we have seen, subsequent population statistics are generally unreliable and ‘either compiled to project specific national claims, or, as with certain foreign census takers, based on insufficient or intentionally distorted facts and sources’.”
On page 92 he writes “Expressions of Macedonian national identity were disregarded, or otherwise poorly grasped by many nineteenth-century commentators. Visitors to Macedonia would tour the country in tow of a representative of one or another of the interested rivals and the traveler ‘assimilated the ideas of his guide rather than divined the nationalism of the people’. Other commentators attested that Macedonians possessed no national consciousness and simply identified as Christians.”
On page 92-93 Nick provides an example of religion being used to substitute for ethnic or national identity. He writes “A parallel account was given in 1888 by the Greek Professor Valavanes concerning his native Cappodocian village. Valavanes concluded that: Hellenism exists almost intact in the Christian community, the Asia Minor Greek ‘does not even know the name of the tribe to which he belongs’. Asked what he is ‘he will answer you promptly Christian’. ‘Very well, others are Christian too, the Armenians, the French, the Russians. ...’ ‘I don’t know’, he will tell you, ‘yes, they too (may) believe in Christ, but I am a Christian’. ‘Aren’t you perhaps a Hellene?’ ‘No, I’m not anything (of the sort). I told you I am a Christian, and again I tell you I am a Christian!’ he will answer you impatiently. According to Valavanes, this demonstrates the close relationship of the notions of Christianity and ethnicity for these people, and they ‘love Russia as a bulwark of the faith against the enemy of Christ’.”
I have always believed that Macedonians had never had the need to define themselves as anything other than Macedonians. Here is what Nick has to say: “A popular term of identification indicating separateness from, others, and acknowledges an individual or group as being Macedonian, is the term ‘nash’ or ‘nashi’, literally meaning ‘ours’ -or ‘one of ours’.
These terms of identification persist even at the beginning of the twenty-first century. Similarly Macedonian Muslims, when referring to other Macedonian Muslims, used the term ‘nash Turchin’ (‘one of us’ / ‘ours – Turk’) instead of simply ‘Turchin’, as was the case when referring to a Muslim Turkish speaker. Depending upon which particular Balkan church maintained religious jurisdiction over a village, the inhabitants might have used the terms ‘Exarchists’ (Eksarhisti) or ‘Patriarchists’ (Patriarhisti) when referring to ‘others’, or when intending to use derogatory labels one could refer to ‘others’ as ‘Bugari’ (Bulgarians) or ‘Grci’ (Greeks). These labels were understood as being representative of a religious association and not as a form of ethnic or national identification.”
Nick in his book also tackles another controversial but less known subject, the role of the Muslim Albanians in Macedonia. On page 454 he says: “From the end of the eighteenth century, Albanian Muslim colonists, more hostile and violent than the Ottoman Turks, commenced moving into Macedonia and over the coming centuries, to the end of Ottoman rule, were notorious persecutors of the Christian population. Although a limited number of historians have acknowledged that Albanian persecution of Christians resulted in Christians emigrating from western Macedonia, the Albanian role in the Islamicisation of the Macedonian Christian population has been largely unnoticed by historians.”
Another less noticeable subject that Nick has tackled in his book is how religion was used to manipulate census numbers. Here is what he has to say on page 454: “Islamicisation can be viewed as a strategy aimed at securing Ottoman rule. At the end of the nineteenth century; when the Empire was in a process of decay, and the Ottomans were attempting to prolong their rule in the land, they claimed that the Muslim element constituted the majority element in Macedonia. The numerical importance of Islamicised Macedonians saw them incorporated into the overall Turkish/Muslim population figures.
Contemporary and modern, accounts of the political rivalry of late nineteenth-century Ottoman Macedonia fail to examine the position of the Macedonian Muslim population. Ottoman Macedonia is too often viewed only from a Christian perspective -in relation to the struggle of the Balkan States for the adherence of the Macedonian Christian population. In contrast, the present work has considered Macedonians of the Muslim religion in terms of perceptions of their own identity. Furthermore, Macedonian Muslim perceptions of Macedonian Christians are of vital importance to the overall aims of this thesis. Evidence obtained indicates that Macedonian Christians were viewed as the same people, but of a different religion, and not as ‘Bulgarians’, ‘Greeks’ or ‘Serbs’. Macedonian Muslims of the sample Reka district had no concept or understanding of the terms ‘Patriarchists’ and ‘Exarchists’ as labels for Macedonian Christians.”
Nick Anastasovski has made use of over sixty primary and more that one hundred and thirty secondary sources as well as numerous other documents to put this book together.
With 520 pages and a large format, “The Contest For Macedonian Identity 1870-1912” is a well researched and easy to read book that everyone should own. It is an excellent defensive weapon to use in the protection of the Macedonian identity.
“The Contest For Macedonian Identity 1870-1912” is the ninth Macedonian book published by Pollitecon Publications. It is available in Australia for $35 plus $10 postage.
In North America the book can be purchased from the Canadian Macedonian Historical Society’s web page www.macedonianhistory.ca for $ 45 Canadian. See http://www.macedonianhistory.ca/html/books.html
The Contest For Macedonian Identity 1870-1912
By Nick Anastasovski
Published by
POLLITECON PUBLICATIONS
PO Box 3102 Abbotsford NSW 2046
Australia Ph: (02) 9715 7608
Fx: (02) 9713 1004
Em: info@pollitecon.com
Web: www.pollitecon.com
Editor & Publisher: Victor Bivell
Front Cover: A Macedonian family from the Reka region of western Macedonia circa early 20th century.
ISBN 978-0-9804763-0-9
@ Copyright 2008
About the author:
Nick Anastasovski was born in 1965 in Bitola, Macedonia. He arrived with his family in Australia in early 1966 and grew up in the western suburbs of Melbourne. He graduated from La Trobe University with a Bachelor of Arts degree with majors in Sociology and Philosophy. He was awarded the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at Victoria University in 2006 for The Contest for Macedonian Identity 1870-1912 (under the title of Contestations over Macedonian Identity 1870-1912). In recognition of Nick's academic performance, he was awarded Outstanding Final Year Research Student in the School of Social Sciences at Victoria University in 2006.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
VINOZHITO’s Second Congress held in the Village Sorovichevo, Lerin Region
By Dimitar Chulev
Translated and edited by Risto Stefov
Sorovichevo, Lerin Region – Around two hundred delegates, European Union guests and journalists attended VINOZHITO’s Second Congress held in the village Sorovichevo, Lerin Region. Top priority was the demand that the Greek government accept reality; the ethnic Macedonian minority exists in Greece and Greece had better start answering to the demands of this party around which this Macedonian minority gravitates. The Congress also insisted that the Greek government open schools and start teaching the Macedonian language.
The gathering at this picturesque Lerin Region village did not pass unnoticed by the Greek nationalists. A group of about twenty nervous looking ultra nationalists, belonging to the racist Golden Dawn organization, attempted to disrupt and prevent the gathering. They were giving out leaflets with slogans like “Get out Bulgarians and Skopje-phils” and “If you came to Amindeo (Sorovichevo), you have come to nowhere” trying to intimidate the delegates. The ultra nationalists were held back by the police who discreetly blockaded them to the road around the cultural building, where the gathering initially began.
The aim of the large presence of police vehicles, since the early morning hours, was to intimidate and discourage the delegates coming from Boden, Seres, Drama, Kukush, Enidzhevardar, Kostur, Kajlari Regions and from the Solun Region villages from attending the Congress.
Pavle Voskopulos, member of the collective VINOZHITO leadership, greeted each delegate individually with much emotion and called out the place in Macedonia where each came from. Delegates were applauded as they arrived.
Grigoris Vallianatos, recently sacked Media Advisor to the Greek PASOK leader Georgos Papandreu, who a short time ago openly expressed his personal opinion asserting that Greece needs to recognize the Macedonian minority, was apologetic to those present because, as he put it, he did not know the Macedonian language.
“In this country officially there are only Greeks, but unofficially, you know and I know that there are Albanians, Turks, Catalonians, Orthodox, transsexuals… but there are also Macedonians: Greek Macedonians or pure Macedonians, generally it is not a question whether we agree or not. This is reality.”
In a press conference Vallianatos said “The people think that Macedonians don’t exist, but here we are in this village as guests – people whose identity is not Greek. The problem is that people in Greece learn about Philip and Alexander and after that there is a long period of emptiness which needs to be filled up.” Regarding learning the Macedonian language in Greek schools, Vallianatos said that in the European Union it is not unusual for different ethnic groups to coexist.
Athanasios –Nase Parisis, VINOZHITO member and president of the Greek European Bureau of Lesser Used Languages (EBLUL) is optimistic that through demands we can push the Greek government to introduce learning of the Macedonian language in Greek schools. It is a reality and can be achieved. “That would be attainable as long as the EU transforms its political power and strengthens its authority to demand of some of its members, like Greece and Bulgaria, to relax their chauvinistic doctrines and negation of their minorities in their countries.”
Max Sinoni from the Corsican movement, an old friend to VINOZHITO who in 1994 invited leaders of this party to Strasburg, was first to congratulate the delegates. “Thank you for inviting me for the second time to come to Macedonia and to encourage you that you as part of the Free European Alliance have full rights to struggle for your rights,” said Sinoni. He also added that “Macedonian or Corsican – we are part of something that is missing but we are representatives of real cultures which exist today.”
Jan Dietrich, representative of the Federal Union of European Nationalities (FUEN) said that “Sometime we forget how hard it is to be a minority in Europe. But the rights of the minorities are not something that is acquired, for that you have to fight.” He called on members of VINOZHITO to continue with the struggle for which there is support in Europe, where every seventh person belongs to a minority or speaks a minority language different from the official language of the state.
“The European Federation consists of 84 organizations from 35 countries and one of its basic principles is achieving rights through dialog; there is no room for aggressive methods,” said Dietrich. According to Dietrich, Greece and its minorities will soon find themselves on the European Parliament agenda.
Neli Maes, European Free Alliance President, sent his congratulations to the Congress by letter with a message to the Greek government which said, “The road to real and democratic Europe starts from Athens, passes through Lerin and ends up in Brussels.”
Abdulhaum Dede from the Anti-Nationalistic Initiative gave his speech with his back turned to the audience. “I am not going to address a non-existent minority, as Karamanlis claims. You exist… We exist, but they don’t want to look at us. They notice us only when they want to call you ‘Skopjani’ and us ‘Musulmani’.”
During the discussion it was ascertained that it was time for the delegates to work harder on the ground and to familiarize the people with their rights and not to be still afraid to freely reveal their identity.
Stojan Georgiev greeted the delegates on behalf of the six-thousand OMO Ilinden-Pirin members and added that the Macedonians from Bulgaria, Greece and Albania are leading a struggle for the recognition of the Macedonian minorities. We see a united Macedonia in the framework of a European Union and of Balkans without borders.
Edmond Temelko, mayor of Pustets, in the name of the Macedonian Community in Albania, which in 2005 registered a political party, ascertained that “We can achieve our rights only through system integration in the country where we live.” Temelko informed the delegates that all schools in Pustets now teach the Macedonian language and Macedonians in Albania are working to implement the same in all regions where Macedonians live.
The first VINOZHITO Congress was held in Solun four years ago.
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MHRMI Thanks Canadian Macedonian Community for Continued Support
Toronto, Canada, December 3, 2008 - Macedonian Human Rights Movement International (MHRMI) would like to thank the Canadian Macedonian community for its dedication to the Macedonian cause and tremendous support for Macedonian human rights.
MHRMI held an information forum on October 26, 2008 at St. Clement of Ohrid Macedonian Orthodox Cathedral in Toronto. Along with special guests Archimandrite Nikodim Tsarknias (in person), and Pavle Filipov Voskopoulos (via telephone), MHRMI gave the community an update on recent human rights developments and its activities surrounding the pursuit of human rights for Macedonians worldwide and specifically in Greece, Bulgaria, Albania and the Republic of Macedonia.
For over two decades, MHRMI has brought the plight of Macedonians to the attention of the world through: meetings with governments, key international policy-makers and non-governmental organizations; targeted attendance at international human rights conferences; and reporting and publishing on the human rights abuses suffered by Macedonians.
Our vision sees a future where Macedonians are officially recognized and can enjoy the most basic of human rights such as freedom of speech, freedom of worship, and respect for their right to self-identification as Macedonians.
The Macedonian communities of the world have become organized, energized and determined to pursue their struggle for long denied, universal human rights. Macedonian Human Rights Movement International needs your support so that we may continue to assist Macedonians in their struggle for human rights.
Please consider giving a monthly, annual or one-time donation by visiting www.mhrmi.org/donation.asp. For more information, please contact us at 416-850-7125 or info@mhrmi.org.
Translated and edited by Risto Stefov
Sorovichevo, Lerin Region – Around two hundred delegates, European Union guests and journalists attended VINOZHITO’s Second Congress held in the village Sorovichevo, Lerin Region. Top priority was the demand that the Greek government accept reality; the ethnic Macedonian minority exists in Greece and Greece had better start answering to the demands of this party around which this Macedonian minority gravitates. The Congress also insisted that the Greek government open schools and start teaching the Macedonian language.
The gathering at this picturesque Lerin Region village did not pass unnoticed by the Greek nationalists. A group of about twenty nervous looking ultra nationalists, belonging to the racist Golden Dawn organization, attempted to disrupt and prevent the gathering. They were giving out leaflets with slogans like “Get out Bulgarians and Skopje-phils” and “If you came to Amindeo (Sorovichevo), you have come to nowhere” trying to intimidate the delegates. The ultra nationalists were held back by the police who discreetly blockaded them to the road around the cultural building, where the gathering initially began.
The aim of the large presence of police vehicles, since the early morning hours, was to intimidate and discourage the delegates coming from Boden, Seres, Drama, Kukush, Enidzhevardar, Kostur, Kajlari Regions and from the Solun Region villages from attending the Congress.
Pavle Voskopulos, member of the collective VINOZHITO leadership, greeted each delegate individually with much emotion and called out the place in Macedonia where each came from. Delegates were applauded as they arrived.
Grigoris Vallianatos, recently sacked Media Advisor to the Greek PASOK leader Georgos Papandreu, who a short time ago openly expressed his personal opinion asserting that Greece needs to recognize the Macedonian minority, was apologetic to those present because, as he put it, he did not know the Macedonian language.
“In this country officially there are only Greeks, but unofficially, you know and I know that there are Albanians, Turks, Catalonians, Orthodox, transsexuals… but there are also Macedonians: Greek Macedonians or pure Macedonians, generally it is not a question whether we agree or not. This is reality.”
In a press conference Vallianatos said “The people think that Macedonians don’t exist, but here we are in this village as guests – people whose identity is not Greek. The problem is that people in Greece learn about Philip and Alexander and after that there is a long period of emptiness which needs to be filled up.” Regarding learning the Macedonian language in Greek schools, Vallianatos said that in the European Union it is not unusual for different ethnic groups to coexist.
Athanasios –Nase Parisis, VINOZHITO member and president of the Greek European Bureau of Lesser Used Languages (EBLUL) is optimistic that through demands we can push the Greek government to introduce learning of the Macedonian language in Greek schools. It is a reality and can be achieved. “That would be attainable as long as the EU transforms its political power and strengthens its authority to demand of some of its members, like Greece and Bulgaria, to relax their chauvinistic doctrines and negation of their minorities in their countries.”
Max Sinoni from the Corsican movement, an old friend to VINOZHITO who in 1994 invited leaders of this party to Strasburg, was first to congratulate the delegates. “Thank you for inviting me for the second time to come to Macedonia and to encourage you that you as part of the Free European Alliance have full rights to struggle for your rights,” said Sinoni. He also added that “Macedonian or Corsican – we are part of something that is missing but we are representatives of real cultures which exist today.”
Jan Dietrich, representative of the Federal Union of European Nationalities (FUEN) said that “Sometime we forget how hard it is to be a minority in Europe. But the rights of the minorities are not something that is acquired, for that you have to fight.” He called on members of VINOZHITO to continue with the struggle for which there is support in Europe, where every seventh person belongs to a minority or speaks a minority language different from the official language of the state.
“The European Federation consists of 84 organizations from 35 countries and one of its basic principles is achieving rights through dialog; there is no room for aggressive methods,” said Dietrich. According to Dietrich, Greece and its minorities will soon find themselves on the European Parliament agenda.
Neli Maes, European Free Alliance President, sent his congratulations to the Congress by letter with a message to the Greek government which said, “The road to real and democratic Europe starts from Athens, passes through Lerin and ends up in Brussels.”
Abdulhaum Dede from the Anti-Nationalistic Initiative gave his speech with his back turned to the audience. “I am not going to address a non-existent minority, as Karamanlis claims. You exist… We exist, but they don’t want to look at us. They notice us only when they want to call you ‘Skopjani’ and us ‘Musulmani’.”
During the discussion it was ascertained that it was time for the delegates to work harder on the ground and to familiarize the people with their rights and not to be still afraid to freely reveal their identity.
Stojan Georgiev greeted the delegates on behalf of the six-thousand OMO Ilinden-Pirin members and added that the Macedonians from Bulgaria, Greece and Albania are leading a struggle for the recognition of the Macedonian minorities. We see a united Macedonia in the framework of a European Union and of Balkans without borders.
Edmond Temelko, mayor of Pustets, in the name of the Macedonian Community in Albania, which in 2005 registered a political party, ascertained that “We can achieve our rights only through system integration in the country where we live.” Temelko informed the delegates that all schools in Pustets now teach the Macedonian language and Macedonians in Albania are working to implement the same in all regions where Macedonians live.
The first VINOZHITO Congress was held in Solun four years ago.
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MHRMI Thanks Canadian Macedonian Community for Continued Support
Toronto, Canada, December 3, 2008 - Macedonian Human Rights Movement International (MHRMI) would like to thank the Canadian Macedonian community for its dedication to the Macedonian cause and tremendous support for Macedonian human rights.
MHRMI held an information forum on October 26, 2008 at St. Clement of Ohrid Macedonian Orthodox Cathedral in Toronto. Along with special guests Archimandrite Nikodim Tsarknias (in person), and Pavle Filipov Voskopoulos (via telephone), MHRMI gave the community an update on recent human rights developments and its activities surrounding the pursuit of human rights for Macedonians worldwide and specifically in Greece, Bulgaria, Albania and the Republic of Macedonia.
For over two decades, MHRMI has brought the plight of Macedonians to the attention of the world through: meetings with governments, key international policy-makers and non-governmental organizations; targeted attendance at international human rights conferences; and reporting and publishing on the human rights abuses suffered by Macedonians.
Our vision sees a future where Macedonians are officially recognized and can enjoy the most basic of human rights such as freedom of speech, freedom of worship, and respect for their right to self-identification as Macedonians.
The Macedonian communities of the world have become organized, energized and determined to pursue their struggle for long denied, universal human rights. Macedonian Human Rights Movement International needs your support so that we may continue to assist Macedonians in their struggle for human rights.
Please consider giving a monthly, annual or one-time donation by visiting www.mhrmi.org/donation.asp. For more information, please contact us at 416-850-7125 or info@mhrmi.org.
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