Macedonia: NATO and the Name Issue

Macedonia's foreign minister Antonio Milososki said this in Helsinki earlier this month: “Republic of Macedonia fulfilled the criteria for membership in the North-Atlantic Alliance, but it will join in when it will be allowed to do so in a dignified manner.” Say: Macedonia comments: “This statement mirrors the public opinion in Macedonia and is illustrating how important is for us Macedonians to be recognized under the only name we find possible: Macedonia, and the ethnic group: Macedonians.”

58 comments

  • macedonas

    When bad behaving children throw a tantrum, they are asked to stand in the corner of the room until they get over it.
    When this happens on a larger scale, then the international community has to wait until the iresponsible leaders of the offending country step down or are thrown out by their people.

  • Eni Macedonia

    The ethnic group can not be called Macedonians.
    Macedonians are of the proudest Greek-Hellens.
    FYROM`s people has nothing to do with Macedonians, exept their nationalistic willing to be called as this.
    They are under fixation that communism has caused.
    It is sad that USA has recognized a country with a name-fraud.
    Ethnic groups in FYROM : Vardar-slavs, Bulgarians, Albanians, …

  • @ Eni Macedonia,

    Why don’t you tell us what ethnics group are found in Greece?
    Most of the people found in the region of today’s Greece didn’t even speak the Greek language when in 1830 western powers decided to form the country that nowadays says it’s 100% pure Hellenes. What has happened to Arvanites, Vlachs, Sarakatchans, Tzinzars and Slavic population.
    A Greek was considered everyone that belonged to the Orthodox religion. Most of the population the region Macedonia had to learn the Greek language even later when more of the territory was attached to Greece. Not to even mention that the demographic character of Northern Greece was completely changed in the beginning of the 20th century by bringing the Orthodox Turks from Anatolia and chasing out the Slavic population, whether they called themselves Bulgarians or Macedonians. The word Macedonia was forbidden for centuries and suddenly now the Greeks became greater Macedonians than the Macedonians themselves.
    What a shame for the cradle of democracy as it stood for in the ancient times!

  • Boris

    Paul Brams

    You are reciting the propaganda you have been fed.

    1:Greece and Greeks have ALWAYS been proud of Macedonia.

    2:Greeks preserved the Greek language in the Ottoman Empire times through the ‘secret schools’.

    3: Your answer is exactly the problem.
    Namely, that there is an on going attempt on behalf of FYROM to discredit Greece and snatch Macedonia from Greeks.
    Your leaders name Airpots and Highways after Hellenic heroes.
    Unfortunately for you and the ones that believe the total lies witch you have written,
    and as long some keep writing them, there will be a problem.

  • John

    Seeing as most people in the Balkans have rocks for brains it’s not hard to explain the idiocy of FYROM sending the country and people down the drain while trying to ride the wave of Greece’s historical glory and adopting names etc. The answer is simple, Vardaska Bonovina, no one will object and you can still keep your pride and dignity.

  • Alexander

    “A Greek was considered everyone that belonged to the Orthodox religion.”

    Paul… are you crazy? A Greek is a Hellene. Macedonia was part of the Hellenic world in Ancient times, much like other ancient states…Sparta, Athens, Corinth, etc… All together they comprised the Hellenic world. Speak to a Greek and ask where they are from and they will answer you… I am a Greek from XXXXX. Ancient Macedonians were Greek (Hellenes), not Slavic. Slavs werent around in ancient times. How are modern day FYROMians related? All the FYROMians are is simply a slavic group that is taking the name Macedonia. Does that mean they are genuine? Absolutely not. They are Slavic. Macedonia is Greece!

  • Peter

    Boris, I see you are always againts Macedonia.Let me informe you of few facts. a) In 1856-58 Greece was conteplating to make the Albanian language as a second official language in Greece. b)Greece consists of many diferent ethnicities. c)there are 3.5 million Albanians,or 35% of total population. d)there are over 1.5 million Macedonians. d)there are more then 1 milion Pontious who are non Greek,only religion same. e)there are more then 750.000 Vlahs,Romi, Turks and others. Do you still maintain that Greece is 99% pure Greeks? Let me remind you that there are no pure Greeks in todays so-called Greece.May I also remind you that 27 out of 57 Prime Ministers of Greece were Albanians.Present day as we speak the Greek President is of Albanian ethnicity,the Prime Minister Karamanlis is of non greek ethnicity,he is a Pontious from Asia Minor. In 1903 Greece had a consul in Macedonia which was under the Ottomans rule.Did ever Greece had a consul in Pelopones-Sparta before or after the formation of Greece? Have you or any Greek know what the Prime Minister of Greece in 1903 Rallis said about Macedonia and Macedonian revolutionaries?.Does it make sense to claim that Macedonia is Greek?. Of course,Greece can make claimes of any sort,falsifie the history,even claiming that the Macedonian Empire of Alexander the Great was Greek.Are you people in your right mind? Why dont you look in the mirror and try to identifie yourselfs who realy you are! Also ask yourselfs, what did Isocrates and Demosthenes said in 337BC after the batle of Chaeronea between Macedonia and Hellas.

  • Boris

    1: Albanians are 2 mIlion, and that’s just recently.

    2: I am a historian, and I get m sources from various parts.
    Unfortunately, what you say is FYROM propaganda.
    Check your sources and see how limited they are.

    Macedonia, the word, the culture is GREEK.
    WAKE UP, read other sources, and avoid FYROM payed historians who are acting under an agenda.
    History can not be re written.
    Wake up!

  • @ Alexander

    First of all I am not of Slavic origins nor I say that the Ancient Macedonians were Slavs. How many people from Greece can claim direct descent from Alexander the Great is another question, I think not many. You are mounting other’s people words to my post. Please reply on what I wrote, don’t insinuate theories from your Greek propaganda.
    It appears that your propaganda worked very well too.
    I don’t condone territory changes in order RoM to snatch the Northern Greece from you, that is just a stupid fix idea or just a material for internal use of the RoM government to win the elections. This is the 21 century for god sake, not the medieval age. Are you frighten by a small country as FYROM is?
    I am very familiar with the recent history and I know and have spoken with live witnesses from Northern Greece so there is no need a biased historian to tell me what has happened. The population changes within centuries, invaders occupy other’s people land but winners write the history. Unfortunately the population of RoM never had a chance before the WW-2 to express their national consciousness in their own state.
    Statements that Tito created Macedonian ethnicity are total crap invented by Greek nationalists.
    Anyway, if my parents stayed in Greece they would be just Greeks as all their kinsmen Vlachs. I know most of the Vlachs voluntarily accepted the Greek nationality but they speak Aroumanesci at home. Knowing the Greek language won’t make me a Greek person no matter how much I try. I can be a Greek citizen but I will still be a Vlach all my life and denying it makes me a degeneric of my roots. That was the point of my post, there are a lot of other ethnicities in Greece besides the Greeks, you can not deny that no matter how hard you try. Sorry.

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