Risto Stefov - Articles, Translations & Collaborations

[George S.]

From the Once Classified Files - Part 32

9:13 PM
Reply ▼
risto stefov
To ;
Royal Yugoslav Consulate General



Montreal, September 2nd, 1936



Hr. 85/36.



Sir,



I have the honour to inform you that a convention will be held in Toronto on Sept. 6th, 1936, for a duration of three days by the Macedonian Organization of Toronto, Ont. This political organization intends to carry a banner of the picture of Vlade Tehermazemski, assassin of the late King Alexander I of Yugoslavia.



We have been informed that the demonstration will march through the main streets of the city of Toronto with the banners which procedure is directed against our Dynasty and our country which is friendly to Canada. Such proceeding is calculated to rouse the feelings of loyal residents of the Yugoslav people in Canada and may provoke a serious breach of public peace and good order besides creating bitter feelings among Yugoslav colonies all over Canada.



Therefore, I earnestly beg your intervention to prevent such proceedings on Canadian soil as organized hero worship of murder which we feel certain has no encouragement either from your Government or from the friendly people of Canada. I may ask you to be so kind as to take the necessary steps as soon as possible because the time is very short.



Enclosed you will find the article from the Evening Telegram of Toronto.



Trusting that you will give our request your kind attention,



I have the honour to be, Sir, Your obedient servant, (George Sigmund), Secretary





Telegram 455



September 3rd, 1940



Bulgarian Minster remarks on Bulgarian-Yugoslav relations, and politically his opinion constitutes over-simplification of a complex situation. They should not be accepted without prior critical analysis. It is true, however, that relations remain normally good though Yugoslavia's slight disappointment and anxiety over Axis lnfluene on the Bulgarian Government and Russian influcnce on Bulgarian population seems now rather paltry.



2. [?South] Macedonian, here again situation is complex. Italy is at work and perhaps Germany too with (incidentally) no friendly intentions towards Yugoslav unity.



3. The Macedonians of South Serbia as distinct from Macedonian leaders outside the country may be divided into three main groups: (1) Ideological Federalists whose spiritual leader is Mihailoff, democratic in outlook but lacking political realism. They tend to idealize Bulgarian people but for the present are generally loyal to Yugoslav State. (2) Communist Federalists, whose goal is a free Macedonia within a great South Slav Federation linked to the Soviet Union. (3) Disconsolate peasantry who resist tax collectors, without their crops, and remain in a perpetual state of discontent against the Serbs.



4. It remains to be seen whether Italian propaganda can re-awaken among the people a movement for an independent Macedonia, this desire for which at present seemed to be practically confined to Macedonian leaders. In any event it seems that the idea of an independent Macedonia under Italian influence is generally regarded as a poor second best by Macedonian leaders who, it seems, would prefer for the present that Macedonians of South Serbia should continue to belong to Yugoslavia as loyal citizens subject to grant of increased local autonomy.



5. Matter should not therefore be over easy for Italy especially if Yugoslav Government are prepared to conciliate Macedonian National sentiment. This they have not so far been prepared to do and recently appointed Ban of Vardarska Banovina is a reactionary “old Serb” with Federalist ideas which he has been putting into practice with brutal thoroughness. It appears however that the Government have been recently trying to moderate his zeal.



6. I agree that it seems hardly necessary to consider question of Macedonia at present moment in connexion with Yugoslav-Bulgaria relations.



7. I am continuing to watch developments of Macedonian situation and am trying to collect material sufficiently well-founded to justify a considered report to your Lordship.



Telegram 306



London, February 16th, 1945



From the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs

To the Secretary of State for External Affairs Canada



CIRCULAR D. 306



My telegram Circular D. 200 of February 2nd.



Yugoslav-Bulgarian Pact. We have received no independent information from Brigadier MacLean regarding negotiations between Yugoslavia and Bulgaria for conclusion of a Pact of Alliance and Mutual Assistance referred to by Soviet Government.



2. Our preliminary view is that proposed Pact would be open to much same objection as a Yugoslav-Bulgarian Federation. Meanwhile, Brigadier MacLean has been instructed to reserve our position if Tito mentions the project.

[George S.]

Australia’s official stance on Macedonia



By J.S.G. Gandeto



Rebutal



Even though I prefer to open my article with a suitable phrase - to grab your immediate attention - this time, I will begin my story with an impromptu question: If you ever find yourself in a time squeeze and are not sure how to proceed or how to react to a given situation, would you:



(a) Do what seems natural to you.

(b) Do what the majority of the people before you have done already.

(c) Take the advice of a fellow who has vested interest in the outcome or

(d) Consult as many scholars/experts on the field as possible before you make your decision.



Obviously, your first initial approach would be to read and understand the question being asked. Second, you would read and analyze the choices given. Next, you would eliminate some of the choices and finally, you would focus on one that, in your opinion, makes the most sense regarding the essence of the question being asked.



Considering the choices given:



Choice (a): Most likely you would not select choice "a" because the question does not allude to things being done instinctively, or on the spur of a moment without some consideration.



Choice (c): Chances are that you would stay away from this one because you may get suspicious and may question this fellow's hidden agenda or motives.



Choice (d): You would decline selecting choice "d" on the strength of the "time squeeze" constraint emphasized within the question itself, thus, the urgency of the decision to be made will preclude its selection. Here, the contrast is obvious; you do not have the luxury of time to indulge yourself in a time consuming research to consult all the experts in the field.



Therefore, your choice most likely would be "b"; do what the majority of people have done already.



In the article "Australia's official stance on the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM)" from September 13, sent to the American Chronicle by the so-called Australian Macedonian Advisory Council and written by certain Paul Kiritsis, their Executive Director, we find the following advice given to the Australian community in advance of the Republic of Macedonia's Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski's visit to Australia scheduled for late October.



He is concerned that you, the citizens of Australia, could "erroneously" call the Republic of Macedonia by its constitutional name and not refer to her by the awkward and insulting acronym-imposed by Greece-Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.



Since Mr. Kiritsis feels that:



"Many Australians have been misled by this continuous propaganda, their ignorance of history, unwillingness to take initiative and educate themselves, lack of conscientiousness and to an extent, anomalous inertness on the part of the Greeks, who remained calm and assured the past few decades because they supposed a culture based on erroneous beliefs could not possibly evade extinction. As a result, a climate conducive to dangerous activities has proliferated surreptitiously in both in Australia and abroad", he would like to prepare you and offer a lesson in history.



Since he finds you ignorant of history, unwilling to take initiative and educate yourselves and since you lack consciousness, he, Kiritsis takes it upon himself to educate, enlighten and advise you how to think and how to act when the Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski from the Republic of Macedonia visits Australia in October.



In his letter of advice to you, the usual Greek propaganda lines are being repeated- ad nauseum- again. He is cautioning you not to offend the Greeks living in Australia by referring to Republic of Macedonia according to her constitutional name. In other words, you need not do what majority of the world's countries have done already; pay no heed to 126 countries of the world among which are: USA, Canada, Britain, China, India, Russia, Brazil and the rest, but rather listen to these Greeks who, with their incessant peevish complaints, have become the laughing stock of Europe.



In their overzealousness to appropriate the inheritance of the Ancient Macedonians and portray them as "Greeks", modern Greeks have demonstrated utter contempt not only for your intelligence and wisdom but also for the leading scholars of the world past and present. They have betrayed the writings of their "own" nineteenth century historians who saw the ancient Macedonians not as brethren but as conquerors of Greece (Roudometof 2000). They have unscrupulously usurped the reporting of the ancient Greek biographers themselves whose description of Greece never included the kingdom of Macedon. To them the boundaries of Greece extended from the Ambracian Gulf in the south to the river Peneus in the north (Strabo, Scylax, Dichaerchus, Scymnus, Dionysius). Are they also suggesting that Isocrates, in his letter to King Philip of Macedon, lied when he told Philip that his "ancestors left Greece entirely and found their kingdom among the people of non-kindred race"? Moreover, weren't the ancient Greeks pleading with the Romans to force King Philip V to evacuate from Greece? (Pol. 16 and 18; Diod. 28. 5ff.; Livy 31-33; Plut. Flamininus). And when Rome defeated the Macedonians didn't they proclaim the liberation of all the Greek cities? (Polybius, xviii,46,5).



Numerous epitaphs do testify and serve as a somber reminder that Ancient Macedonians and the Ancient Greeks were two distinct and quite antagonistic neighbors who were embroiled in constant squabbles and disputes ranging from territorial disagreements to form and style of government. Consider the following epitaph for the ancient Greek hero Demosthenes:



“O, Demosthenes, if your strength was equal to your wisdom, Greece would have never been enslaved by a Macedonian Ares.”



Or perhaps you prefer these few preserved lines that unambiguously testify to the veracity of our claim regarded the ancient Macedonians as brethren:



“With the fallen Hellenes at Chaeronea was buried the freedom of Greece.”



No amount of propaganda can erase the meaning of these lines; Greeks at Chaeronea were fighting the Macedonians "to safeguard the liberty of Hellas". No amount of half-truths can suffice and overcome these incontrovertible facts; Ancient Macedonians conquered the ancient Greeks and kept them under the Macedonian yoke for centuries. Garrisons, which are sure sign of servitude, are not stationed in your own country; "As long as Chalcis, Corinth and Demitrius, the fetters of Greece, are garrisoned by the Macedonians, there will be no freedom for the Greeks."



In lieu of these and plethora of other irrefutable facts how do you justify your claim that Macedonia was always Greek? What idiosyncratic sinister drives possessed your soul to assume that lies can be passed over as truth? Or do you suppose, with your twisted logic, that others are ignorant, uneducated and without conscience (I forgot that you do) and that you, perched on your broken Greek marble, can dispose the truth as you see fit?



(Do you ever consider that your pervasive and barbaric attacks on our Macedonian identity will have lasting and negative, detrimental consequences for generations to come and that your bigoted, racist attitude towards our ethnicity has planted seeds of mistrust, prejudice and hate to last another five hundred years? When will you grow up? When will you realize and come to your senses that we, the ethnic Macedonians want nothing from you that does not belong to us. Is asking for permission to visit the graveyards of our beloved departed grandparents too much? Is asking to be allowed to freely use our Macedonian language at home and in schools too hard to comprehend? And when we declare that we are ethnic Macedonians, is it really up to you to decide what we can or cannot call ourselves?).



I am profoundly puzzled as to how you Greeks present these facts to your students? Will you ever reconcile and tell the truth for once? Aren't you the only country in the world that celebrates its conqueror?



Be reminded that slogans history do not make. Be reminded that historical truth presented to serve domestic market will not find a fertile ground abroad. You can twist the truth, slip and slide around the facts, lie to your own people and demonize your neighbors but at the end you will suffer the inevitable defeat; you will drown into your own manipulative lies.



Mr. Kiritsis who thinks that you are ignorant of history continues:



"At this time, I will not engage you with a lengthy dissertation on historical truth. Any historian or scholar involved in serious critical inquiry will honestly disclose that the history of Macedonia (the geographical region) is an integral part of Greek history and that its actors were the Macedonian Greeks, from before Alexander the Great to the Greeks of the Byzantine Empire and the contemporary ones (http:/ /macedonia-evidence.org/).



Those who can, indeed, do engage in a lengthy dissertation of historical truth-they provide evidence to back up their claims. Those who cannot, refer you to websites.



Contrary to what Mr. Kiritsis alludes in the passage above that ancient Macedonia is an integral part of Greece, the evidence points to the opposite direction and cannot support such an elusive act. Greece occupied historic Macedonia for the first time in 1912, 1913 with the Balkan Wars. Never before that date did Greece ever claim Macedonia as part of Greece. Fact is that Greece maintained a consular office in Salonica prior to 1913. Countries do not open a consular office in their own cities; do they? Similarly, one is hard pressed to find evidence for the newly created designation "Macedonian Greeks" before 1986. Who were these people who kept silent over their dual ethnicity? Why were they hiding? Do Australians know or remember of any such designation prior to 1986? Can these Greeks provide a shred of evidence for this ethnic description? Isn't it a grotesque lie?



Fact is that Greece in her drive to exterminate the ethnic Macedonians has lost her political compass, is perilously close to losing her credibility and is dangerously manipulating the truth to her own populace. It is true that with her protracted campaign against the Republic of Macedonia, she is winning some minor skirmishes here and there, but truth is also, that you do not stop the bleeding of a severed aorta with a Band- Aid application.



Instead of reading and listening to your own Australian son, professor A. B. Bosworth, who says that the Greeks with Alexander in Asia were known for their absence from any major battle, the Greek Advisory Council in Australia wants to educate you and give you a "proper" guidance of protocol - the Greek style. Their laughable attempt to appropriate the ancient Macedonian Kingdom and steal the Macedonian legacy is an attempt to disrespect, obfuscate and denigrate world Academic Institutions.



The ancient kingdom of Macedon has nothing to do with Greeks. Alexander and his father Philip looked down upon these Greeks with utter contempt. Ancient Greeks have nothing in common with this mongrel race of residuals that inhabit Greece today.



Author after author, being disenchanted with modern Greeks' behavior and attitude, have depicted them as an agglomeration of Albanians, Vlachs, Slavs and Turks. Their violations of human rights of the ethnic Macedonians living in Greece and their continuous persecution and torment of them is a tantamount to thumbing their nose at the United Nations' universally established and accepted human rights codes of conduct and principles. In their path to procure documents, secure evidence or manufacture new one to support their inadmissible claims, these people will resort to corruption, deceit and willful endangerment of the well-being of anyone who dares to challenge their stands.



The world is simply tired of their fake concern about the name. It is amply transparent that their crocodile tears about the name are just a front to blur and deflect the real attention from the gist of their crime; the continuous denial of existence of ethnic Macedonians living in Greece whose human rights are being daily violated and whose existence as people is being threatened. That is the real issue with Greece today. These ethnic Macedonians are the real thorn in Greece's behind because they expose and reveal to the world that democracy in Greece is a total farce. The inhumane treatment of the Macedonian minority in Greece is slowly but gradually emerging as a colossal problem for them that must be addressed sooner than later.



I know and strongly believe that Australians are quite able to separate the truth from fiction and act accordingly. I also know and wholeheartedly believe that Australia will soon join the majority of the countries of the world and refer to the Republic of Macedonia by its chosen constitutional name.



A memorable encounter (20)



From Metz Epitome 53-62.



King Porus of India responds to Alexander's emissary's message to bring tribute and hostages to Alexander and meet him at the boundaries of his kingdom:



“Porus, King of India, has this to say to Alexander: No matter who you are -and I am told that you are a Macedonian -it is better for you to remain at a distance and to reflect upon your own misfortunes rather than envy another. Porus is undefeated up to this time, and Darius caused me no alarm. So, imbecile, don't give me orders. Just set one foot in my territory with hostile intent and you shall learn that I am king of India, that none but Jupiter is my master.”



I brought this passage up for only one reason and that is to emphasize the fact that even people of so far away places, like India, knew who the Macedonians were. Greek web sites inform that when Persians came in contact with the Macedonians, they described them as Greeks: “Yauna takabara”, the "Greeks with sun hats", a reference to the Macedonian headwear. Fair enough. Now let us go to Herodotus the man who should know a thing or two about the Macedonians, and see what he had to say about the Persian arrival in Greece.



He states that the Thessalians were the first Greeks to fall under Persian control in 480-79 B.C. (Hdt. 7.130). Fact is also that Persian army was in Macedonia since 492 B.C. (Hdt. 6.42-45), which gives Herodotus more than a decade's time to recognize that the "Greeks" in Macedonia, the "Yauna takabara," were the first Greeks to fall under Persian rule. That did not happen because Herodotus knew better; he did not place ancient Macedonians under Greek ethnic umbrella.



The Theft of a King – Who Stole Alexander

ISBN: 978-1-4327-6856-0

Publisher: Outskirts Press, Inc.



By Gandeto, J.S.G.



1. What is the book about?



The book centers on Alexander the Great and the Ancient Macedonians’ ethnicity. It elaborates topics related to the differences between the ancient Macedonians and the ancient Greeks and attempts to dispel the modern notion – one originating in the 19th century and thereafter propagated by some western authors – that ancient Macedonians “were” Greeks. Also, in the book the reader will find glimpses of today’s dispute between the Republic of Macedonia and Greece regarding the name of the Republic of Macedonia, in essence, what lies hidden behind this carefully orchestrated Greek problem with the name. Readers will have a chance to get acquainted with modern-day Balkan politics where deep-rooted historical intrigues, stereotyping and ingrained prejudices do justice for tolerance and rational thought.



The book offers glimpses into our continuous struggle to return Alexander to his rightful place - among his Macedonian kinsmen. Yes, it is a feeble voice in the dark, but a voice nevertheless, that isn't going to die any time soon. Through the topics discussed in the book, the reader will have a chance to see and understand the other side of the story. In the words of Marquez Garcia, "Our enemies have crushed many roses before but they haven't succeeded in stopping the spring from coming."



Compelling questions:

..If Alexander the Great was a Greek king, why would he dismiss his own "Greek" troops in the middle of his Asian campaign in 330 B.C.? (Arr. III.19.6-7; Plut. Al. 42.5; Diod. XVII.74.3-4; Curt. VI.2.17).



Why would Greeks in the mainland, supposedly his own people, rebel against him?



Why would the Greeks call the Lamian War a "Hellenic War" if they were fighting the Macedonians?



2. Why did you decide to write it?



My main objective was twofold: to bring to the forefront the differences between the ancient Macedonians and the ancient Greeks and to shed some light on much overlooked and, by some authors largely ignored, facts about the ethnicity of the ancient Macedonians.



I could no longer stay silent in lieu of such incontrovertible evidence left to us from the ancient chronographers that clearly distinguished and separated the ancient Macedonians from the ancient Greeks. I felt compelled to respond to the blatant and dishonest manipulation of historical evidence in order to circumvent and subvert the universally declared human rights covenants and obligations.



3. How did you get your book published?



A friend of mine suggested Outskirts Press as a reputable vehicle to reach my audience; I’m glad I did.



4. What types of readers will be interested in your book?



I would be happy if today’s younger generation gets a “whiff” of the twisted political winds in the Balkan and understand how distortions and manipulations of historical facts can be used for political gains.



5. What is special about your book? What differentiates it from other books in the same category?



What separates this book from other books in the same category is the blunt straight forward – no gloves – attitude. There is no glossing over, no need to look for clues hidden in between the lines or sugar-coating politically correct terms. If I have perceived historical distortions being sold as fact, I have described them as lies; if unsupported of evidence claims are propagated as truths, I called them fabrications; if historical injustice has been committed, I find no acceptable reason to remain silent regardless of socio-political consequences. Conscience compels me to act and stand against all social injustices.



If modern day Greeks succeed in their diplomatic offensive to convince the world that Alexander the Great and his Macedonians were actually Greeks, then such a verdict may accomplish two things: (a) prove that historical evidence can be ignored (and in this case it would be), that records can be manipulated and subverted, and (b) inflict irreparable damage to the confidence and the faith entrusted in the hands of scholars and academic institutions world wide. Such a verdict will amount to nothing less than the theft of a king. On the other hand, if justice prevails, as it should, then we may safely conclude that Alexander and his legacy would continue to rest among his Macedonians whom he considered his natural kinsmen and with whom he shared his troubles, setbacks, sufferings and pain as well as jubilation in his victories.



6. Have you published any other books? Do you plan to publish more?



Yes, I have. In 2002 I published The Ancient Macedonians – Differences between the Ancient Macedonians and the Ancient Greeks, One Golden Ray upon the Rock, a novel in 2005 and The Wolves of Trapper’s Bluff in 2007.



I most certainly will continue to write.



The book is available through most of the book stores;

http://www.outskirtspress.com/thetheftofaking

J.S.G. Gandeto was born in Lubojno, Macedonia. Educated at Ss Cyril and Methodius University of Skopje, Republic of Macedonia. He immigrated to United States and continued his studies at Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan and Nova South-Eastern University in Fourth Lauderdale, Florida where he received his post graduate degrees. He recently completed his 29th year as an educator and has since retired and is continuing to pursue his passion in writing. In 2002 he published his first book Ancient Macedonians - Differences between Ancient Macedonians and the Ancient Greeks. In 2005 he published the romantic novels One Golden Ray upon the Rock and in 2007, The Wolves of Trappers Bluff.



In the Macedonian Language he has published the following novels: Spasa's Light in 2004, Saraf in 2009 and Rosamarina's Grave in 2010. Book of poems Muabeti in 2003, poemata Ko Jagne in 2005 and Majka -Egejka in 2009. Currently, he is preparing for publication his latest novel Folded Impressions.

[George S.]

From the once classified files - Part 34

27/09/2011
Reply ▼
risto stefov
To ;
Telegram 554



London, April 12th, 1944



From the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs

To the Secretary of State for External Affairs Canada



CIRCULAR D. 554



Following for the Prime Minister. Begins:



The development of a Resistance Movement in Bulgaria has brought to the surface again the Macedonian question. There are a considerable number of Bulgarians fighting with Tito’s men in southern Serbia and Macedonia, and Tito’s programme includes the establishment of an autonomous Macedonia. The Bulgarian Resistance Movement proper is divided on the Macedonian question, some sections of it advocating an autonomous Macedonia and others not.



2. We are determined at all costs to avoid being involved in the Macedonian question at this stage, and our liaison officers in Bulgaria are to be instructed to make it perfectly plain that we decline to discuss the question with anyone, and that our only concern is in getting Bulgaria out of the war and freeing Greek and Yugoslav territory from Bulgarian forces.



3. The Macedonian question has been the bane of Bulgarian politics for many years. It involves all Balkan countries to a greater or lesser extent. The Greek Government from the early days of the war have been suspicious of any contact we have had with the Macedonians, and our support of Tito in southern Serbia and of the Bulgarian Resistance Movement has led to a renewal of this nervousness. An autonomous Macedonia would cut across Greek aspirations to a frontier rectification with Bulgaria in, for instance, the Struma Valley. Tito’s advocacy of an autonomous Macedonia is understandable as part of his programme of diminishing Serbian influence, since such a state could only be formed at the territorial expense of Serbia. Our support of Tito, however, does not include support of his anti-Serbian aims. Bulgarian interest in Macedonia is, of course obvious.



4. Our information regarding the present situation in Macedonia and the Macedonian movement is, however, far from complete and, since the Partisans operating in Macedonia are under Tito’s control, we are asking our liaison officers in Yugoslavia to supply us with a report on their activities. Ends.



SECRETARY OF STATE FOR DOMINION AFFAIRS





Telegram 775



London, May 7th, 1945



From the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs

To the Secretary of State for External Affairs Canada



CIRCULAR D. 775



My telegram Circular D. 52? of 29th March.



Yugoslavia



Ambassador, Belgrade, reports that Yugoslav Government decides on April 26th to recognize Hoxha’s Administration as Government of Albania and to establish diplomatic relations with that Government and with Bulgaria.



2. Yugoslav Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs informed Ambassador that he would receive an official notification of this effect. Ambassador replied that while decision about Albania was comprehensive, he did not quite understand the position regarding Bulgaria as that Yugoslavia is still at war with that country. Under-Secretary explained as Bulgarian Army was fighting along side Yugoslav troops in the liberation of the country, it was natural that Yugoslav Government should wish to establish some kind of diplomatic relations with Bulgarian Government. He explained that the position of Yugoslav representatives in Sofia would be analogous to that of Sir N. Charles in Rome.



SECRETARY OF STATE FOR DOMINION AFFAIRS





Telegram 488



London, December 12th, 1946



From the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs

To the Secretary of State for External Affairs Canada



CIRCULAR D. 488



My telegram Circular D. 1150, 10th December.



Greece



Current discussion on alleged incursions over Greek frontier by her northern neighbours contain frequent references to Macedonian autonomous movement NOF. This organization is present day counter-part of former autonomous movement IMRO and OCHRANA; but it differs in being more closely allied with Yugoslav-Macedonian aspirations, in relation no doubt to suspected plans for Yugoslav and Bulgarian Federation after signature of Peace Treaty with later country. The following notes by United Kingdom Consul General at Salonica on NOF, may therefore be of interest, Begins.



1. During the enemy occupation of Greece, Bulgaria, not content with Eastern Macedonia and Western Thrace, was anxious to annex Central and Western Macedonia, and with German permission infiltrate OCHRANA agents who operated mainly in the area between Florina, Kastoria, Kozani and Edessa. Kalcheff, now serving a life sentence in Greece as a war criminal, was the chief of OCHRANA in Greece. OCHRANA’s aims were exactly the same as those of IMRO. At that time there was no collaboration between OCHRANA and EAM/ELAS. On the contrary there were frequent clashes, and ELAS disarmed OCHRANA bands wherever it could.



2. As, however, Axis power showed distinct signs of weakening another organization was indicated, this time an anti-fascist one, and about July-August 1944 SNOF (Slavomakedonski Narodni Osloboditelni Front) was founded, the members of which were the same as those of OCHRANA with a few additions. Directives now came from Moscow – though via Tito – and SNOF collaborated with EAM/ELAS until about October-November 1944 when a split occurred and Gotche (alias Gotseff) its military leader, and his men withdrew into Yugoslavia (Vardar Macedonia). It is said that this split was cause by EAM/ELAS insistence on bringing SNOF bands further south, presumably with the object of utilizing them against the Government and British in Athens, and by Gotcheff’s refusal to abandon his own are.



3. Subsequently SNOF dropped the S (Slavomakedonski), which was objectionable to a large section of KKE following, and became NOF. That this latter is merely the continuation of SNOF is admitted in a leader in “Deltion” of 20th February. “Deltion” claims to be the “official organ of NOF” and is believed to be published in Skopje. It is printed in Makedonski and Greek. In the same issue, an extract from a manifesto is published by ASNOM (Antifascist Council of People’s Liberation of Macedonia) urging “Macedonians” under Greece and Bulgaria to participate in the “gigantic antifascist front” which is the only way “to win the right of self-determination and unity of the entire Macedonian people under the aegis of Tito’s Yugoslavia”.



4. It is correct that NOF does not participate in “autonomous activities” in that it does not work for Macedonian autonomy in the true meaning of the work (which was the object of IMRO when first founded in 1891-1892), nor for autonomy and the incorporation with Bulgaria, which IMRO and OCHRANA subsequently stood for. For reasons best known to Moscow, Belgrade and Sofia, NOF now owes allegiance to Tito, and the means to ensure Macedonia passing under his “aegis” would be the union of “Vardar” (Yugoslav), “Aegean” (Greek) and “Pirin” (Bulgarian) Macedonia under the president of Vardar Macedonia at Skopje – to form a single unit of the Federal State. This is clear from another leader of “Deltion” of 15th March, where it is stated that “from the early days, the Macedonian people had expressed its will to live with the people of Yugoslavia, since the Yugoslav people esteem it (the Macedonian people) as a people, and since under Marshal Tito’s wise leadership the Macedonian people, in a common struggle with the people of Yugoslavia, won its national freedom for the first time”. In the same leader it is said that “the Macedonian people of Aegean Macedonia is right in wanting union with its supporter the leading Macedonia of Vardar”.



5. Nor is it only NOF which holds such ideas. Tito in his speech at Skopje on October 11th, 1945, as reported in the “Deltion” of 21st October, spoke of the unity of all Macedonians within Federal Yugoslavia and rebuked Bulgarian “reactionaries” who still spoke of “Greater Macedonia” i.e. “independent” Macedonia. Ends.



SECRETARY OF STATE FOR DOMINION AFFAIRS

[George S.]

The Macedonian Digest

“From the readers for the readers”

Edition 70 – October 2011



======oOo======

Editor’s Notes



Our Name is Macedonia

https://www.mhrmi.org/our_name_is_macedonia

Feature Stories



Macedonia's prime minister - A profile of Gruevski

Aug 12th 2011, 16:53 by T.J.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/easternapproaches/2011/08/macedonias-prime-minister

On July 28th "European Voice", the Economist's sister EU-affairs newspaper, published my profile of Nikola Gruevski, Macedonia's prime minister. With the odd adjustment for style, here it is.



MACEDONIANS either love him or loathe him. To his detractors, Nikola Gruevski, who was confirmed as prime minister for a third term on July 28th, is corrupt, a populist, a ruthless Machiavellian and an enemy of a free media. “No, no, no,” say his supporters. He is as clean as a whistle, modest, the scourge of tax-dodging tycoons and a family-values man to his core.

The divisiveness of the dominant figure in Macedonian politics is not simply a matter of domestic concern. Macedonia has been a candidate for membership of the European Union since 2005, was close to civil war a decade ago, and has been embroiled in a bitter conflict with Greece over its name for almost 20 years.



Born in 1970, Mr Gruevski was brought up in a family that was neither privileged nor poor. His father worked in furniture and design; his mother was a nurse and, after his parents’ divorce, it was she who brought him up. When he was four, she went to work in Libya, like thousands of other Macedonians, and took him with her.



That was a brief episode in a childhood in which the young Gruevski dreamt of being a doctor, a footballer or a cosmonaut. One thing he says he did not think about much was politics—or, for that matter, the story of his paternal family.



His father was born in northern Greece; his grandfather, mobilised by the Greek army, was killed fighting the Italians in Albania after Italy’s invasion in 1941. Then, in the wake of Greece’s civil war, like thousands of other Slavs in Greek Macedonia the family fled north to what was then Yugoslav Macedonia. Maybe this is an emotional component of the story of the struggle with Greece? No, says Mr Gruevski; until recently he was never that interested in the story. Nor, he says, did he feel especially moved when he visited the ancestral village in 2001.

The young Gruevski’s family did not talk much about politics, with one exception. Jordan Miljakov, his uncle, “talked about politics all the time”. Mr Mijalkov was the representative of a Macedonian textile firm in the then Czechoslovakia. When Yugoslavia began collapsing, Mr Gruevski thought of joining his uncle and going to film school there.



He opted, instead, for economics at home. And Mr Mijalkov became the first interior minister in the government that led Macedonia to independence in 1991.



Mr Mijalkov’s memory is cherished by many. It was he who ordered the seizure of Yugoslav army documents, which meant that the army could not mobilise Macedonians to fight in Croatia. Soon afterwards, he was killed in a suspicious car accident in Serbia.



The incident did not force Mr Gruevski into political activism, but he did hang out with members of the nationalist party that he now leads, whose name is so long that even its initials are laborious: VMRO-DPMNE.



After university, where he dabbled in amateur dramatics and boxing, Mr Gruevski entered the nascent finance sector and was the first person to trade on Skopje’s stock exchange. In 1996, he entered politics, becoming a local councillor in the capital. The next year he began writing on economics. This was how he first made a name as an economist. In 1998, he was minister of trade, and in 1999 became minister of finance.



Today, say the name "Gruevski" and one might think of the giant bronze statue of Alexander the Great that has just been unveiled in Skopje, or all the other statues of saints and politicians that are being erected every week as part of a policy of boosting national identity. But a few years ago it was different. This was the man who began deregulating the economy, introduced VAT, a flat tax and restituted property taken by the communists.



In many respects, Mr Gruevski was, for his party, the right man in the right place at the right time. With communism gone and Macedonia independent, the technocratic, English-speaking Mr Gruevski was just the type the party needed to refresh itself. But few would have expected the economics-focused whizz-kid to outsmart his opponents, come to lead his party, and win three elections in a row.



The first years after he became prime minister in 2006 were characterized by growth and a focus on the economy. Then came the 2008 Bucharest NATO summit at which Greece effectively vetoed Macedonia’s accession, because of the name issue. “I was shocked,” says Mr Gruevski. From then on, the focus changed, a shift perhaps also encouraged by the world economic crisis. Unemployment now stands at 31.7%. Mr Gruevski played the national card and won.



Many Macedonians have literally wept with joy to see the statue of Alexander, but for Macedonia’s socialist opposition Mr Gruevski is the devil incarnate.



Take the case of A1 television. A1 was a beacon of the free media, they say, and now it has been virtually killed off for its criticism of Mr Gruevski. Three newspapers from the same group have just closed their doors. Nonsense, says Mr Gruevski’s camp: Velija Ramkovski, the owner, never paid his taxes and then used A1 and its journalists as a human shield when raided by the police.

Some non-partisans are unconvinced. “When it comes to power he is a boxer,” says one source, “and he won’t stand in the way of people taking out opposition media. He is vindictive and when it comes to the media he is totally selective when it comes to implementing the law.” For such delicate issues, the prime minister needs someone he can really trust, they say—and they point out that the country’s security chief is Mr Gruevski’s cousin, Saso Mijalkov, the son of Jordan Mijalkov.



And Greece? After the Bucharest summit, Mr Gruevski launched a case against it at the International Court of Justice. But, he says, the chances of a deal in this complex issue are “much better than before”. He gets on with George Papandreou, Greece’s prime minister; he and Papandreou’s predecessor, Kostas Karamanlis, detested each other.



He has had more success with Macedonia’s ethnic-Albanian population, which makes up about a quarter of the country’s 2m people. Ten years ago, Macedonia teetered on the brink of an all-out civil war pitting ethnic Albanian guerrillas against the security forces. Now Mr Gruevski is in coalition with Ali Ahmeti, the former leader of those guerrillas. The new government has an Albanian minister of defence and deputy prime minister in charge of European integration.

Both Albanians and Macedonians grumble, but as one EU official remarks: “We’d kill for a government like that in Bosnia.” The price for this second coalition, though, was somewhat distasteful: four war-crimes cases against Albanians have been set aside.



“Nikola is just Nikola”, chortles a friend. Ordinary people can identify with him, he is like the bloke next door—and he is literally that, because he disdains his official residence, preferring to live in his small flat, with his wife and two small children. And, notes the friend, to win so many elections he must be doing something right, after all.

[George S.]

The Macedonian Digest

“From the readers for the readers”

Edition 70 – October 2011



======oOo======

Editor’s Notes



Our Name is Macedonia

https://www.mhrmi.org/our_name_is_macedonia

Feature Stories



Macedonia's prime minister - A profile of Gruevski

Aug 12th 2011, 16:53 by T.J.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/easternapproaches/2011/08/macedonias-prime-minister

On July 28th "European Voice", the Economist's sister EU-affairs newspaper, published my profile of Nikola Gruevski, Macedonia's prime minister. With the odd adjustment for style, here it is.



MACEDONIANS either love him or loathe him. To his detractors, Nikola Gruevski, who was confirmed as prime minister for a third term on July 28th, is corrupt, a populist, a ruthless Machiavellian and an enemy of a free media. “No, no, no,” say his supporters. He is as clean as a whistle, modest, the scourge of tax-dodging tycoons and a family-values man to his core.

The divisiveness of the dominant figure in Macedonian politics is not simply a matter of domestic concern. Macedonia has been a candidate for membership of the European Union since 2005, was close to civil war a decade ago, and has been embroiled in a bitter conflict with Greece over its name for almost 20 years.



Born in 1970, Mr Gruevski was brought up in a family that was neither privileged nor poor. His father worked in furniture and design; his mother was a nurse and, after his parents’ divorce, it was she who brought him up. When he was four, she went to work in Libya, like thousands of other Macedonians, and took him with her.



That was a brief episode in a childhood in which the young Gruevski dreamt of being a doctor, a footballer or a cosmonaut. One thing he says he did not think about much was politics—or, for that matter, the story of his paternal family.



His father was born in northern Greece; his grandfather, mobilised by the Greek army, was killed fighting the Italians in Albania after Italy’s invasion in 1941. Then, in the wake of Greece’s civil war, like thousands of other Slavs in Greek Macedonia the family fled north to what was then Yugoslav Macedonia. Maybe this is an emotional component of the story of the struggle with Greece? No, says Mr Gruevski; until recently he was never that interested in the story. Nor, he says, did he feel especially moved when he visited the ancestral village in 2001.

The young Gruevski’s family did not talk much about politics, with one exception. Jordan Miljakov, his uncle, “talked about politics all the time”. Mr Mijalkov was the representative of a Macedonian textile firm in the then Czechoslovakia. When Yugoslavia began collapsing, Mr Gruevski thought of joining his uncle and going to film school there.



He opted, instead, for economics at home. And Mr Mijalkov became the first interior minister in the government that led Macedonia to independence in 1991.



Mr Mijalkov’s memory is cherished by many. It was he who ordered the seizure of Yugoslav army documents, which meant that the army could not mobilise Macedonians to fight in Croatia. Soon afterwards, he was killed in a suspicious car accident in Serbia.



The incident did not force Mr Gruevski into political activism, but he did hang out with members of the nationalist party that he now leads, whose name is so long that even its initials are laborious: VMRO-DPMNE.



After university, where he dabbled in amateur dramatics and boxing, Mr Gruevski entered the nascent finance sector and was the first person to trade on Skopje’s stock exchange. In 1996, he entered politics, becoming a local councillor in the capital. The next year he began writing on economics. This was how he first made a name as an economist. In 1998, he was minister of trade, and in 1999 became minister of finance.



Today, say the name "Gruevski" and one might think of the giant bronze statue of Alexander the Great that has just been unveiled in Skopje, or all the other statues of saints and politicians that are being erected every week as part of a policy of boosting national identity. But a few years ago it was different. This was the man who began deregulating the economy, introduced VAT, a flat tax and restituted property taken by the communists.



In many respects, Mr Gruevski was, for his party, the right man in the right place at the right time. With communism gone and Macedonia independent, the technocratic, English-speaking Mr Gruevski was just the type the party needed to refresh itself. But few would have expected the economics-focused whizz-kid to outsmart his opponents, come to lead his party, and win three elections in a row.



The first years after he became prime minister in 2006 were characterized by growth and a focus on the economy. Then came the 2008 Bucharest NATO summit at which Greece effectively vetoed Macedonia’s accession, because of the name issue. “I was shocked,” says Mr Gruevski. From then on, the focus changed, a shift perhaps also encouraged by the world economic crisis. Unemployment now stands at 31.7%. Mr Gruevski played the national card and won.



Many Macedonians have literally wept with joy to see the statue of Alexander, but for Macedonia’s socialist opposition Mr Gruevski is the devil incarnate.



Take the case of A1 television. A1 was a beacon of the free media, they say, and now it has been virtually killed off for its criticism of Mr Gruevski. Three newspapers from the same group have just closed their doors. Nonsense, says Mr Gruevski’s camp: Velija Ramkovski, the owner, never paid his taxes and then used A1 and its journalists as a human shield when raided by the police.

Some non-partisans are unconvinced. “When it comes to power he is a boxer,” says one source, “and he won’t stand in the way of people taking out opposition media. He is vindictive and when it comes to the media he is totally selective when it comes to implementing the law.” For such delicate issues, the prime minister needs someone he can really trust, they say—and they point out that the country’s security chief is Mr Gruevski’s cousin, Saso Mijalkov, the son of Jordan Mijalkov.



And Greece? After the Bucharest summit, Mr Gruevski launched a case against it at the International Court of Justice. But, he says, the chances of a deal in this complex issue are “much better than before”. He gets on with George Papandreou, Greece’s prime minister; he and Papandreou’s predecessor, Kostas Karamanlis, detested each other.



He has had more success with Macedonia’s ethnic-Albanian population, which makes up about a quarter of the country’s 2m people. Ten years ago, Macedonia teetered on the brink of an all-out civil war pitting ethnic Albanian guerrillas against the security forces. Now Mr Gruevski is in coalition with Ali Ahmeti, the former leader of those guerrillas. The new government has an Albanian minister of defence and deputy prime minister in charge of European integration.

Both Albanians and Macedonians grumble, but as one EU official remarks: “We’d kill for a government like that in Bosnia.” The price for this second coalition, though, was somewhat distasteful: four war-crimes cases against Albanians have been set aside.



“Nikola is just Nikola”, chortles a friend. Ordinary people can identify with him, he is like the bloke next door—and he is literally that, because he disdains his official residence, preferring to live in his small flat, with his wife and two small children. And, notes the friend, to win so many elections he must be doing something right, after all.

[George S.]

Eurobasket - Skopje rejoices as Macedonia stuns Greece
Sat, 03 Sep 21:54:00 2011

http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/030920...un-greece.html

Macedonia produced their second successive shock of the European Championship with an emotional 72-58 win over Greece, sparking big celebrations in the former Yugoslav republic's capital Skopje.

Finland, playing in their first major event since the Eurobasket in 1995, also upset Bosnia 92-64 while Slovenia struggled for three quarters against Georgia before pulling away in the final period to register an 87-75 success.

Croatia beat Montenegro 87-81 and Russia's reserve shooting guard Vitaliy Fridzon enjoyed a memorable evening as he led his team to a 79-58 thrashing of Belgium with 22 points.

Macedonia, having lost to double European champions Greece by 32 points at the 2009 European Championship, pulled off the biggest surprise of the tournament so far after showing how much they had improved in Thursday's 78-76 win over Croatia.

Led by American-born point guard Bo McCalebb, who scored a game-high 27 points, the Macedonians blew away their bigger neighbours as centre Pero Antic added 12 points and eight rebounds for the winners.

"We played in a state of trance and our defending was quite simply fantastic. This win means a lot to us because we have given the whole nation a huge lift," Macedonia coach Marin Dokuzovski said.

"I am sure the whole of Macedonia will celebrate tonight but we can't get carried away because we have a difficult game against Finland who have also proved their worth," he added.

About 5,000 people, sporting national flags and setting off fireworks, gathered in Skopje's central square to celebrate and more were expected to arrive during the night.

Macedonia has strained political ties with Greece because of a dispute over the former Yugoslav republic's name, which is the same as a province in northern Greece where Alexander the Great was born.

Many fans who descended on the square said beating Greece meant more to them than the unlikely prospect of winning the 24-team tournament in Lithuania, which Macedonia entered as rank outsiders.

"I am a Macedonian expatriate living in Australia on holiday here and when I go back I will give my Greek friends more banter than they can possibly take," 40-year old Tome Tomevski told Reuters.

"We argue over politics all the time but there will be no dispute over this because our boys played them off the court.

"As far as I am concerned, they don't have to win another match," he said. "They can return home tonight to join the party which appears set to last until the morning."

There was also plenty of joy for the Finns, who rekindled their own hopes of reaching the second group stage after five players finished with double scoring figures against Bosnia.

Point guard Mikko Koivisto scored 17, playmaker Petteri Koponen had 14, centre Gerald Lee added 12 while forwards Hanno Mottola and Tuukka Kotti hauled 10 each to cancel out a good solo effort by Bosnia's Henry Domercant, who put on 25 points.

Croatia stayed on course to reach the second group stage, featuring two groups of six, after centre Ante Tomic scored 26 points to fend off a spirited challenge by neighbours and fellow former Yugoslavs Montenegro.

Point guard Marko Popovic added 23 points for the Croatians, who joined Greece and Macedonia at the top of Group C with a 2-1 record, ahead of Finland, Montenegro and Bosnia who have one win and two defeats each.

Slovenia and Russia have three wins out of three in Group D while Ukraine registered their first with a 67-59 victory over Bulgaria.

Reuters

First loss for Greece in the Eurobasket - FYROM beats the national team by 14 points

By George Georgakopoulos

http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_wsite5_9363_03/09/2011_404743

Greece suffered a 14-point defeat in the hands of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia on September 3, the national team’s first loss in this European Championship.

FYROM won 72-58 to rise to the top of the group’s table, along with Greece, having beaten both of the pool’s favorites, Greece and Croatia.



The Greeks seemed somewhat distracted from the propaganda war of their opponents (Skai radio reported that their government paid for fans to travel to Lithuania and sport flags and scarves with the name Macedonia and the star of Vergina on them) and were unexpectedly negative in attack.



FYROM had Bob McCalebb in a great day, scoring 27 points, as the Greek defence – Nick Calathes and Nikos Zisis in particular – could not contain him.



What is more, the insistence on three-point shots despite a terrible scoring rate proved disastrous, as the Greek attack could not translate its dominance in rebounds into more points.

This first ever loss to FYROM may have no more consequences than the Greek prestige hurt, but is showing that the team of coach Ilias Zouros still has long way to go before it resembles the side that six years ago won the Eurobasket and reached the World Championship final by beating the US in 2006.



Captain Antonis Fotsis was Greece’s top scorer with 16 points, while Yiannis Bourousis had 10 points and 10 rebounds.



The next game for Greece is against Montenegro on September 4.

[George S.]

MP Karygiannis accused of berating civil servants


By CBC News, cbc.ca, Updated: August 26, 2011 6:49 PM

http://news.ca.msn.com:80/top-stories/mp-karygiannis-accused-of-berating-civil-servants

Controversial Liberal MP Jim Karygiannis is the focus of complaints from Canadian government officials over allegedly verbally abusive behaviour, CBC News has learned.

Immigration officials have complained that Karygiannis, the MP for Ontario's Scarborough-Agincourt riding, has used what they call unparliamentary language on multiple occasions in dealing with staff and takes an aggressive tone with civil servants.

Reached by CBC News, Karygiannis said he suspects there is an orchestrated campaign to smear him.

"I've had a good working relationship with the civil servants going back to 1988. I can probably get things done that a lot of other members [of Parliament] cannot get done because I contact them and say I need your help, and the help is always there," he said.

"You don't get re-elected time and time again because of the work that you do if you don't look after your constituents. And people will not look after you and not be helping you if you're not nice to them."

A spokeswoman for Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney wouldn't confirm the complaints. She pointed to an incident at a House of Commons committee meeting in 2009 when Karygiannis accused a departmental official of not wanting to admit black immigrants into Canada.

"We cannot release details of Mr. Karygiannis’s interactions with departmental officials without his consent," Candice Malcolm wrote in an email.

"It is already public that Minister Kenney wrote a letter to the chair of the Citizenship and Immigration committee after Mr. Karygiannis was verbally abusive toward CIC officials when they appeared to answer questions.

"We expect anyone dealing with civil servants, especially members of Parliament, to show the same level of respect and decorum with which they would want to be treated. Yelling and/or use of profane language toward civil servants by members of Parliament is not acceptable.

History of controversial remarks

Karygiannis, the Liberal party's multiculturalism critic, is hosting 19 cultural groups this weekend for meetings in Ottawa with Liberal MPs to talk about issues they face.

But some major cultural groups in Canada are boycotting the meetings and demanding Karygiannis be forced out of his portfolio, alleging he holds controversial views that make him unsuitable for the job.

The groups point to statements made by Karygiannis that they say make him an offensive pick.

CBC News has obtained a letter from B'Nai Brith Canada, a leading Jewish group, as well as press releases from Macedonian, Turkish and Chinese groups, demanding Liberal Interim Leader Bob Rae replace Karygiannis in his role.

Rae wasn't available Friday for interviews.

The letter and statements are, in part, in support of complaints by the Macedonian Human Rights Movement International, who noted a 2011 event in Toronto where Karygiannis used a derogatory word to describe Macedonians.

Karygiannis says he was referring to a term that's used in Greece to describe Macedonians from the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

"The Macedonians of FYROM in Greece are referred to as Skopjans. That's a statement which is true. That's how they're referred to," Karygiannis said.

He's also championed causes that have split cultural communities, including successfully pushing Parliament to pass a motion that "acknowledges the Armenian genocide of 1915 and condemns this act as a crime against humanity." Karygiannis says he's willing to sit down with anyone and talk.

"If they don't like it, then they will say OK, let's do a number on Jim. Well, that's fine. But my motto is respect, accept, celebrate and embrace."

Anita Bromberg, general counsel for B'nai Brith Canada, says the organization is concerned about some of the positions Karygiannis has taken.

"Our point today is that multiculturalism is a call for a united front, for bringing communities together ... where he's been so divisive in the positions he's taken, then we are suggesting to the Liberal Party that they reconsider whether he's the best representative of putting forth that aim."

[George S.]

Not another BIG Greek Lie?


Growing up in Greece as a foreigner from USSR

September 4, 2011 by Guest Writers

http://wiredandready.net/2011/09/04/ussr/#more-987

Editor’s Note: The Author is a personal friend and her post has been edited and directed by me. It is a bit caustic but at the same time is illuminating. How a foreigner from Eastern Europe experienced Greece while growing up. She wants to remain anonymous.

I have never blogged before and I want to apologize if this post doesn’t meet the blog readers’ strident criteria. I was browsing the internet this week and I accidentally came upon this blog and one article caught my attention. I asked Stefanos whether I could share my opinion with the readers and I was granted the privilege. I am originally from Russia and I was born in the early 80s. I was unlucky to be born behind the iron curtain in a true soviet-communist environment but at the same time lucky enough to witness its destruction. At school during those years we were fed propaganda: USSR is the best country and tries to liberate poor countries from the evil clutches of Capitalism, USA is evil, Capitalism bad (you know the usual) and we had no idea what was going on in the world, other than what the teachers told us.



When USSR collapsed, my dad brought our family to Greece to start anew. For us it was paradise. A rich country in the EU that enjoyed the freedoms and prosperity the western world shared. It was a difficult transition since I spoke no Greek (or English) and I had a rough time during high school. But I was elated. I immediately started using the internet and I started reading about the world and the developments going on those years. Access to information was a right not allowed during communist rule. I couldn’t believe how may lies we were fed and how they wanted to control us through propaganda. Before I started my life in Greece I was thinking how great it would be since they had the choice to do anything they wanted without a secret police spreading fear.



The more I was growing up the more disillusioned I became. First of all most Greeks are intolerant or not receptive to foreigners. I was ostracized as a foreigner at the public school I attended. I didn’t care about that a lot. I cared though about students or teachers going on strike and our school not functioning. The teaching standards were very low (one advantage of the USSR was the high quality of teaching, even though with the propaganda), cheating was common. Another problem was the propaganda the teachers were trying to spread. I was so hurt by the lies at the Russian elementary school that I developed an allergy to any kind of propaganda. Most students didn’t care about their academic future but only on how to escape school one more day or go for a smoke.



After doing great at the national exams (I had became fluent in Greek) I got the right to attend a university in Greece. If I was disappointed with Greece by then at 20 (I had to start at a younger class high school) but the situation inside the universities (and outside) that disappointment would a “light” description. I do not know where to begin and where to stop. Lectures were attended by fewer than 20 people out of a class size of more than 200. Professors were sometimes coming late or ignoring their lectures. Other times their “assistants” were doing the lectures. Exams were filled with cheaters who were not punished (or even caught). More students never came to any lectures, they were smoking during lessons. If that was a temple to knowledge then Greeks had desecrated it. And desecrating they were, pillaging, destroying it. When something is given away for free people do not treat like theirs.



Political parties at the universities were more interested in boosting their memberships than for any particular ideology or objective I remember I was approached by the communist youth, only because I was Russian. I had never (Nor have I yet) met so many slimy people all under one roof. At least in communist countries political parties are illegal. Those parties were always on a race who would close down the university. I missed two exam periods and I didn’t have the luxury to lose any more. I was working at the same time to make ends meet. I took a decision that until now has proved the best one I have made. I want to pause and congratulate to all young Greeks who failed to enter the Greek AEI. It will only do you good. I decided to cut my losses and move and study abroad. I didn’t want to become a public employee and I really wanted to learn my science, instead of getting a worthless piece of paper.



Studying abroad let me enjoy responsibly my life. It was tougher but also worth it. Now I work for an MNC (Multi National Company) out from Russia and I am responsible for South East Europe. I still come to Greece since it is part of the markets I am responsible for, I also come for vacations. I want to feel sorry for Greeks but their failure is 100% theirs. At least we Russians we had communism forced upon us, Greeks have no valid excuse. Greeks are very insular and close minded people who they have a god given right over others just because their ancestors created the Parthenon.



In Greece there is no respect for things they do not like. Rules have no validity and people try to come up with excuses why they won’t obey the law. I was in Athens for a business meeting and I went out for dinner with my Greek co-workers. I was notified that the law had changed and it was forbidden to smoke outside. One Greek co-worker of mine asked for an ashtray and started enjoying a cigarette. His “excuse” was that it is not “his fault” but the shopkeeper’s since it was he who gave him the ash tray.



As a person who came to this country loving it, trying to escape a repressive regime, I wanted to love my new home 100%. Now I do not. Greek politicians treat foreigners as a political chip. Greek universities produce a majority of unskilled army of youth. Yes there are great Greeks, with a good heart, good education and great skills. But you won’t find them in Greece, they have escaped the vortex.



Last but not least, Greeks have a tendency to riot/protest against everything. For example even now the students (who will be the biggest beneficiaries by reforming the rotten universities) are resisting change. I really cannot understand the average Greek. The ignorance Greeks have about reality is incredible. Greeks love this bubble of theirs where everything that happens and doesn’t agree with their view of the world, is a conspiracy orchestrated by some unknown foreign power. In Greece there is too much liberty, that it breaches onto other people freedoms. When you close down traffic to make a point you are infringing on my freedom too, you pig!



Probably my experience in the USSR helped me form a critical mind and question everything. Greek society is nothing close to the Soviet society but they share one thing in common, a big elite part of the state who has it easier than the rest. There is no way people who have experienced communism to be in favor of it. On the contrary Ex-communists are the biggest opponents of it. The only ones who talk about communism and its rotten ideology are people who have no idea what communism is really about.

Seriously you need to be retarded (or brainwashed to support it).



I know from first hand and my social circle that whomever could, has already left Greece for abroad. I know what the country is going through. Eastern Europe went through this transition in the 90s. The best and the brightest have left, only the true left wingers have remained. What a pity.



PS if Greece wants a better future it should go through communism. That’s the only solution to do the reforms it needs without KKE and any other leftwing organization brining the country to its knees every week.

[George S.]

The Byronic look: overweight and unattractive

http://www.guardian.co.uk:80/books/2011/aug/26/lord-byron-unattractive-poser

BBC series on Regency Britain paints an unflattering portrait of 'self-regarding poser' Lord Byron

Mark Brown, arts correspondent - guardian.co.uk, Friday 26 August 2011 15.52 BST


When a man is noted for his Byronic looks he is generally chuffed – dark, handsome, attractively unavailable. Slightly morose, it's true, but in a sexy way.

The reality though should now be amended to overweight, not at all attractive and thoroughly unpleasant. Or, as historian Lucy Worsley puts it: "Self-regarding poser."

Worsley, chief curator at Historic Royal Palaces, believes that the word Byronic is bandied around without people really knowing what it means.

She makes her claim in her new three-part series on Regency Britain made for BBC4.

"Byron certainly wasn't born a Regency pin-up," she said. "He made himself into one through very careful manipulation of his image."

That Byron had a serious weight problem became obvious when the filmmakers visited Berry Brothers wine merchants in St James where, 200 years ago, the poet would weigh himself on enormous scales along with his fellow dandies.

There are still ledgers recording the results and the 5ft 8in (1.73m), 18-year-old Byron weighs in at a hefty 13st 12lbs (88kg), which the programme makers are classing as "borderline obese" because he had his boots on.

Byron went to great efforts to lose his weight, such as playing cricket with seven waistcoats and a great coat on and going to steam rooms to sweat it off.

And to be fair, Worsley said, he was down to 9st 11lbs when he was 23.

Byron also suffered from a problem foot from childhood resulting in a life long limp.

"He would not waltz," said Worsley. "He could not be seen on the dance floor as it would be contrary to his dignity. He wouldn't let his girlfriend, Lady Caroline Lamb, waltz either if he couldn't do it."

Of course, in portraits he looks handsome, not least in the famous Thomas Phillips painting – with Byron in Albanian dress – which is in the National Portrait Gallery.

But that was all part of his studious manipulation of his image.

"There were images that he would not allow to be reproduced in his books of poetry because he looked too boyish," said Worsley. "He wanted to look theatrical and dramatic.

"There are lots of images where he looks like a pallid, slightly podgy young man. Just not impressive."

His poetry of course struck a huge chord in Regency Britain and he became very famous, very quickly, known for his scandalous behaviour. "I think he enjoyed being a little bit 'mad, bad and dangerous' to know, as Lady Caroline called him."

Any redeeming features about Byron are heavily offset by his appalling abuse of the opposite sex. "What he did to women was dreadful – getting them pregnant and stealing their kids from them," said Worlsey. " I don't admire him at all."

The series begins on Monday on BBC4 and Byron features in the third episode.

It covers much of the excess of Regency Britain, not least of the Prince Regent himself. The makers visit Brighton Pavilion where there is a replica of one of his corsets and a pair of his 54-inch waist breeches. But, Worsley adds, this was a man described as "having for breakfast two pigeons, three beef steaks, a glass of brandy and some champagne."

[George S.]

British document shows Greek plan to invade İstanbul



22 August 2011

http://www.todayszaman.com/news-2546...-istanbul.html

A newly released book titled “İngiliz Yıllık Raporlarında Türkiye: 1922” (Turkey in Annual British Reports: 1922), part of a series of the same name by Marmara University history professor Ali Satan, includes a document drafted by the then-British high commissioner in İstanbul indicating that the Greek army had planned to invade the city in July 1922.

According to the document, written by British High Commissioner Nevile Henderson, Greece asked the allied powers for permission to invade İstanbul and was denied this approval on July 31, 1922. The British government along with France and Italy showed no tolerance for the plan and stopped Greece from realizing its ambition.

Great Britain recalled its fleet located in the Mediterranean to İstanbul to show its determination in line with the other great powers to stop Greek troops from entering the capital city of the Ottoman Empire, which was occupied by the allied powers at the time.

Henderson stated in his report that the assignment of Georgios Hatzanestis as commander-in-chief of the Greek Army in Asia Minor instead of Anastasios Papoulas in May 1922 was the first step in the occupation plan. Hatzanestis was known as a radical and a hawk in comparison to his colleague. Henderson indicated the attack on Samsun was a pre-strike prepared by the Greeks to facilitate the implementation of the occupation plan.

According to Henderson, the march of four Greek divisions to İstanbul was a very stupid move that was designed to restore the morale of Greek soldiers and thus weaken and demoralize the enemy by directly capturing the capital city. The occupation plan failed roughly a month before the last big battle, which took place between the Turkish and Greek armies on Aug. 26. Ali Satan addresses the significance of the document by implying that if the Greek army had succeeded in invading and occupying İstanbul, the Turkish army would have had to fight to take İstanbul back before fighting for İzmir.


From the International Scene



Turkey, minorities, and the 1936 declaration

http://www.charismanews.com/world/31...ous-properties

The Turkish government made a historic U-turn in state policy this past weekend, issuing an official decree inviting Turkey’s Christian and Jewish communities to reclaim their long-confiscated religious properties.

The Aug. 27 decree comes 75 years after the Turkish government seized hundreds of lands and buildings owned by its Greek, Armenian, Syriac and Jewish communities.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced the surprise decision on Sunday in Istanbul, addressing a large gathering of Istanbul’s non-Muslim religious leaders representing 161 minority foundations. Invited as the honored guest for an iftar (breaking the fast) meal near the end of the Muslim month of Ramadan, Erdogan declared, “The times when citizens in our country were oppressed for their beliefs, their ethnic heritage or the way they dressed is over.”

Acknowledging past injustices inflicted on those of different faith groups, he vowed, “Those days are over. In our country, no citizen is superior to another.”

Seated next to the prime minister at the dinner, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of the Greek Orthodox Church told the press afterwards that the new decree represented “the restoration of an injustice.”

In a deliberate clarification the next day, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu emphasized that the government’s formal decision was “not a gesture toward minorities, but the return of the rights of legally equal citizens.”

The landmark decree is a significant step toward eliminating decades of unfair practices imposed by the Turkish state against its non-Muslim citizens.

Within hours of the surprise announcement, the boards of Turkey’s minority religious foundations in Istanbul were scrambling to review the status of their confiscated immovable properties. They must apply within the next 12 months to the General Foundations Board to recover each individual property.

Their former holdings include schools, churches, cemeteries, stores, hospitals, orphanages, houses, apartment buildings and factories that were seized by the Turkish state and re-registered as public or foundation properties. A number were later sold to third parties.

Previous changes in Turkish legislation enacted in 2003 and again in 2008 took only limited steps to correct a 1936 Declaration which had officially registered an incomplete list of minority properties. A further ruling in 1974 had prohibited non-Muslim communities from acquiring new property.

The new decree states that owners of properties sold by the state to third parties will be reimbursed at market value. According to Radikal newspaper, the Ministry of Finance will determine the amount of compensation for property that had been sold to third parties, who will not be required to relinquish these lands or buildings back to their original owners.

Significant Step to EU
The return of these extensive properties to their rightful owners has been a key demand of the European Union, to which Turkey is applying for full membership.

The unexpected government decree came after rising pressures from the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), which has slapped heavy fines on Turkey in recent years for failing to return these seized properties to their Christian and Jewish owners. Although the ECHR has declared the expropriations a violation of both local property rights and international law, Turkish nationalists had for decades blocked any legal changes.

During July, both the EU and United States congressional leaders had upped their rhetoric regarding the long unresolved issues of religious freedom for Turkey’s non-Muslim citizens. In a statement on July 13, EU Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fule cited a number of legislative issues on religious freedom that Turkey had not yet implemented: lack of legal personality, restrictions on the training of clergy, compulsory Islamic education, religious affiliation on identity cards and property ownership.

“Missionaries are widely perceived as a threat to the integrity of the country and to the Muslim religion,” Fule added, observing that the dialogue launched by the Turkish authorities with non-Muslim religious communities “has yet to produce tangible results.”

That same month, Ankara reacted strongly to a measure passed by the Foreign Affairs Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives calling for Turkey to “return stolen Armenian and other Christian churches to their rightful owners.” Still pending approval by both the House and Senate, the amendment was attached to the State Department’s Authorization Act for 2012.

In an EU statement yesterday, Fule called the decree “positive and conducive to the respect of freedom of religion in practice.” He cautioned, however, that the EU Commission would “monitor closely the implementation of the new legislation, in contact with both the Turkish authorities and the non-Muslim religious communities.”

Ironically, the Istanbul offices of the Secretariat General for EU Affairs are situated in a former grade school building of the Greek Orthodox Ayios Fokas Church in Ortakoy. A case to reclaim this property, formerly owned by the church’s Mektepler Foundation, is still before the ECHR.

The minority properties expected to be returned in Istanbul include more than 50 large cemeteries; several properties of the Jewish community in Kandilli, on the Asian side of the Bosphorus; and a number of buildings owned by both the Surp Pirgic Armenian Hospital Foundation and the Balikli Greek Hospital Foundation.

[George S.]

Concerns


Taliban targets descendants of Alexander the Great

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/6214794/Taliban-targets-descendants-of-Alexander-the-

Great.html#.TkkBlyXHGQk.email


For centuries, the blond-haired, blue-eyed people of the Kalash tribes of North West Pakistan have lived a libertine lifestyle.


The group, believed to be descendants of Alexander the Great's invading army, were shielded from conservative Islam by the steep slopes of their remote valleys.

While Sikhs, Hindus, and Christians were slowly driven out of Pakistan's North West Frontier Province by Muslim militants, the Kalash were free to drink their own distilled spirits and smoke cannabis.

But the militant maulanas of the Taliban have finally caught up with them and declared war on their culture and heritage by kidnapping their most devoted supporter.

Taliban commanders have taken Professor Athanasion Larounis, a Greek aid worker who has generated £2.5 million in donations to build schools, clinics, clean water projects and a museum.

They are now demanding £1.25 million and the release of three militant leaders in exchange for his safe return.

According to local police, it was Professor Larounis's dedication to preserving Kalasha culture that Taliban commanders in Nuristan, on the Afghan side of the border that made him a target.

Confirmation of the Taliban's role in his kidnapping came as their leader Mullah Omar urged American and Nato leaders to learn from the history of Alexander the Great's invasion of Afghanistan and his defeat by Pushtun tribesmen in the 4BC.

He was kidnapped on Sep 8, when five masked Taliban broke into the three storey museum where he was living, killed a policeman guarding the building, tied a teacher to a post and grabbed the professor from his bed.

Ajmeer Kalash, a Kalash teacher who witnessed the incident, said he had saved his own life by pretending to be a Muslim.

"I did not understand their language and they did not understand mine. I tried to make them understand in Urdu language that I'm a teacher at the school."

He said the men asked for his religion and "I told them that I'm a Muslim by reciting Kalma, though I'm a Kalash."

"They brought out the Greek national and they opened fire at his police guard. The policeman died on the spot. They took me and the Greek citizen to the forest. There they tied my hands to a tree and left me there and went away," he said.

Locals said the professor had been visiting the area since 1994 when he first came as a tourist and fell in love with the area's unique culture and its people's links to his own in Greece and Macedonia.

Today there are an estimated 3,000 Kalasha left in three remote and steep valleys in Chitral in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province. The children wear their hair in orthodox Jewish-style ringlets and sport bright coloured topi hats. The women occasionally have tattooed faces, wear long black robes with coloured embroidery.

The Kalash are known as 'Black Kafirs' to local Muslims who regard them, and their women in particular, as immoral. They are scornful of their festivals and rituals, which include a rite of passage in which a prepubescent boy is fattened in the mountains over a summer and then when he returns is allowed to have sex with any woman he chooses.

Married Kalash women are able to elope with other men if the object of their desire accepts a written proposal and agrees to may double her dowry to the abandoned husband – often in cows.

Professor Larounis, who is believed to have been living in the Kalash Valleys with his wife, had generated around two and a half million pounds in aid for 20 projects in the Kalash Valleys, including clean water schemes, and the museum in Broon village in Bumburet.

Since his kidnapping Kalash women have demonstrated for his release, while elders have travelled to Nuristan to try to negotiate with his kidnappers.

[George S.]

Choices

Viewing cable 06ATHENS784, GREEK REACTION TO HUMAN RIGHTS REPORT


If you are new to these pages, please read an introduction on the structure of a cable as well as how to discuss them with others. See also the FAQs

http://wikileaks.org:80/cable/2006/03/06ATHENS784.html

Reference ID

Created

Released

Classification

Origin

06ATHENS784

2006-03-22 14:30

2011-08-26 00:00

UNCLASSIFIED

Embassy Athens

VZCZCXRO8087
RR RUEHAG RUEHDA RUEHDF RUEHFL RUEHIK RUEHKW RUEHLA RUEHLN RUEHLZ
RUEHROV RUEHSR RUEHVK RUEHYG
DE RUEHTH #0784/01 0811430
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 221430Z MAR 06
FM AMEMBASSY ATHENS
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 4861
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE
UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 ATHENS 000784

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

EUR/SE, DRL/CDA FOR DELL, EUR/PPD FOR TEAL

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PHUM PGOV KPAO GR HRIGHTS
SUBJECT: GREEK REACTION TO HUMAN RIGHTS REPORT


ENTIRE TEXT IS UNCLASSIFIED.

¶1. SUMMARY: The release of the 2005 Human Rights Report
(HRR) received wide coverage in most major Greek media and a
range of reactions from post's human rights contacts. More
than fourteen print articles factually conveyed the report's
account of human rights abuses occurring in Greece, but saved
space to criticize the U.S. as well. A number of stories,
especially broadcast news, noted that the report on Turkey
was more critical than the report on Greece. Two
Slavo-Macedonian minority groups issued press releases
criticizing the terminology used to describe them. A
Ministry of Foreign Affairs representative called the report
"factual and neutral," and one of Greece's most active and
prolific human rights NGOs praised the report as "the most
comprehensive ever." END SUMMARY.

Journalists Grill Poloffs
-------------------------
¶2. Shortly after the report was released in Washington on
March 8, poloffs held an on-the-record press briefing
attended by nine journalists from major Greek dailies. The
journalists bluntly questioned the report's criticism of
government policies and actions towards Roma, TIP victims,
asylum seekers, immigrants and Jews, giving poloffs the
opportunity to discuss key issues in detail, as well as
explain how the report is researched and drafted. One
reporter challenged the section of the report that
highlighted desperate housing conditions and inadequate
schooling for Roma -- an issue, she said, that the U.S.
"obviously doesn't understand." She went on to explain how
we misinterpret Greek idioms for anti-Semitism, illustrating
that no harm is meant when "thrifty Greeks" are referred to
as "Jews." Several journalists questioned whether we were
officially "recognizing minorities" (namely the
Slavo-Macedonians) by listing self-identified minorities in
the report. Mentioning both Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib,
reporters questioned U.S. credibility to draft the HRR. PA
guidance left poloffs well positioned to explain how the USG
actively addresses human rights issues at Guantanamo and
share our mutual concern over, and response to, the prison
abuses in Iraq.

Press Focuses Turkey Report Being Worse that Greece Report
--------------------------------------------- -------------
¶3. At least 12 major Greek outlets and numerous regional
papers, as well as most evening broadcast news covered the
release of the report. Most print articles detailed the
human rights abuses from the report's summary, mentioned the
self-identified minority groups listed in the report, and
quoted poloff statements on Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. Most
print articles had a negative slant; some called the report
"unflattering" and the U.S. "presumptuous" to have written
it. Apoyevmatini, however, spun the story positively in
"Kudos by the U.S. to Greece," citing that the GoG "generally
respected the human rights of its citizens" and detailing
improvements mentioned in the report. The broadcast news
gave short, factual articles of the Greece report, with
nearly equal coverage of the report on Turkey. The report on
Turkey was described as more severe than the one on Greece,
and press highlighted the problems of the Greek minority and
Ecumenical Patriarchate. The ANA Daily News Bulletin carried
side-by-side stories entitled "Greece Respects Human Rights,
US State Dept Says" and "State Dept...Slams Turkey on
Patriarchate."

MFA and NGO Find the Report "Factual" and "Comprehensive"
--------------------------------------------- ------------
¶4. Greg Vassiloconstandakis, U.S. desk officer at the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told poloff that he and Greek
Ambassador to the U.S. Mallias were "happy" with the content
and tone of the report. Specifically, he commented that the
report was factual and that the inclusion of more statistics
and figures made the report "more vivid, for better or
worse." He thought the word "minority" was used neutrally
and factually and said that the inclusion of improvements in
the country's human rights record were "appreciated." There
was no public mention of the report by any ministry.
Greece's most active and prolific human rights NGO, Greek
Helsinki Monitor, praised the new summary format, called the
report "the most comprehensive ever," and expressed hope that
it would get the attention of the government "for all that it
says."

Macedonian Minority Criticize Terminology, Praise Content
--------------------------------------------- ------------
¶5. The Macedonian Human Rights Movement International
(MHRMI), based in Toronto, issued a press release March 10
expressing its "profound disapproval" of the State
Department's "systematic policy of questioning the legitimacy
of the Macedonian minority in Greece" by the report's use of

ATHENS 00000784 002 OF 002

the terms 'Slavophones' to describe the people and
'Slavo-Macedonian' or 'Slavic dialect' to refer to their
language (rather than as 'Macedonian'). The March 16 press
release of the Florina-based Rainbow Party, a minor
Macedonian political party in the Greek province of
Macedonia, praised specific references to human rights
violations against the minority, including European Court of
Human Rights judgments against Greece. However the Rainbow
Party was disappointed that the terms 'Slavo-Macedonian' and
'Slavophone,' were used, which "fully comply with Greece's
official position" and "do not conform to the report's
justified and sharply critical attitude towards Greece."
Their press release called for the 2006 HRR to refer to the
people and their language with their "only acceptable name"
(Macedonian) as both the Council of Europe and European
Bureau for Lesser Used Languages do, "for the sake of
objectivity, human rights, but, most of all, human dignity."

¶6. COMMENT: Media coverage of the Human Rights Report on
Greece remains largely an exercise in semantics rather than
substance. No media question our information, they simply
question our right to judge other countries on human rights.
With continued, open discussions of the most persistent human
rights problems, we are hopeful more Greek journalists will
increase coverage and sensitivity to these issues without our
prodding. We see eye to eye with the MFA on most human
rights issues, and will continue to push these issues with
our interlocutors there.
Ries

[George S.]

Free Advice



AMAC suing the Australian Macedonian Weekly



http://au.greekreporter.com/2011/08/25/ ... stralians/



The appeal of the Australian Macedonian Advisory Council from the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal against the Macedonian newspaper ”Australian Macedonian Weekly” took place recently in Melbourne.

The law suit is over an article containing vulgar insults aimed at Greece and Greeks.

The article entitled “Who in this celestial world gave the Greeks the right to take away the Macedonian language?” was posted May 14, 2009. It included historical falsities regarding the alleged “abduction” of the national identity, ancestral land and language of “Macedonians” by the Greeks.

The writer of the article describes the Greeks as a “thieving nation” that chose to carry out the plan of the hellenization of Macedonia through the most brutal and inhumane methods ever invented and used against other human beings”.

The writer accuses Greece of using its “fascist” army to hellenize Macedonia claiming that, ” this thieving nation meticulously engaged its fascist army in destroying anything Macedonian and replacing it with Greek “.

This delirium continues with the writer accusing Greece of “ethnic cleansing of the Macedonian people from their homes” and of other “murders perpetrated in the name of Hellenism”.

He concludes saying that “these Greek deranged bastardly monsters took the Macedonian language away from our Macedonian children”.

The Australian-Macedonian Council which monitors the Slav propaganda, appealed last year to the Committee for Equal Opportunities and Human Rights of Victoria, against the newspaper for racist attack on the Greeks, in accordance with relevant laws of the state.

As the Committee had no jurisdiction to deal with such appeals, the case was referred to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal seeking the condemnation of the article as offensive, as it undermines the unity of the multicultural society of Australia and incites violence.

The treasurer of the Australian Macedonian Council John Pelekanakis stated that the language of the article forced the Council to refer the matter to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal.

“The language of the article is so insulting, outrageous I would say, that we are compelled to appeal against the article. As we emphasized during the hearings, the use of such language can lead to conflicts between members of two communities, Greek and Slav-Macedonian, to the detriment of the unity of a multicultural society. Moreover, as the publisher of AMW confessed, in response to a question from our counsel Tom Hurley, a similar article possibly published by the Macedonians in a Greek newspaper, with such sharp, derogatory characterizations would have surely caused violent reactions of the Macedonian community, “explained Mr. Pelekanakis.

“We also wanted to denounce, in the wider Australian society, the provocative activities of the Macedonians, who like to play the victims of Greek aggression. We believe that the condemnation of this article by the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal will make the Slav propagandists realise their mistake and hope it will act as a deterrent, ” he added.

The Tribunal’s decision will be issued in a month.


For Immediate Release:


Contact: UMD Director of Australian Operations Ordan Andreevski +61438385466



Australian Tribunal Dismisses Greek Lobby's Frivolous Legal Action Against Macedonian Newspaper



September 4, 2011 - Melbourne, Australia - The United Macedonian Diaspora (UMD) congratulates the Australian Macedonian Weekly for successfully defending the right to a free press in Australia. On August 30, 2011, Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal Senior Member Ms. Noreeen Megay dismissed the complaint brought against the Macedonian newspaper by the Greek political lobby group AMAC, ending a two-year legal dispute.


"In her ruling, Ms. Megay quoted the preamble of the anti-discrimination law, which recognizes that freedom of expression is an essential component of a democratic society," said UMD Director of Australian Operations Ordan Andreevski. "It appears that AMAC has forgotten that this is not Greece, and that newspapers in Australia have the right to express the facts about Macedonian history, even though they contradict the official state propaganda of Athens. However, it is unfortunate that Australia's institutions have been used by AMAC to harass a Macedonian newspaper, much in the same way that legalistic games are used in Greece to suppress freedom of expression."


Despite the confusing name "Australian Macedonian Advisory Council," AMAC is in fact a Greek organization with ties to the "Pan-Macedonian Association" in Melbourne, and other Greek groups which provide financial backing to them. AMAC has a history of making wildly offensive statements against Macedonians in general, and working hard to negate the Macedonian identity in Australia, as per the official policy of the Greek state.


At the tribunal, AMAC relied on the testimony of Professor John Melville-Jones, the University of Western Australia academic known for expressing the Greek government's anti-Macedonian agenda in Australia, comparing the Macedonian nation to "mythology," and making highly obnoxious statements such as: "I have met a number of people from (Macedonia) in Perth... they were often not well educated, they have generally not been in a position to question the distorted view of history that is the basis of their nation..."


Perth-based UMD Board Member Dame Krcoski stated: "The Macedonian ethnic media in Australia will not be intimidated or silenced by baseless lawsuits. Unfortunately, the Australian taxpayer is the real victim in this, because AMAC is wasting government resources to further the odious political agenda of a foreign state. Australians should be angered by AMAC's abuse of the public purse."


"Though hard to prove, it is very likely that AMAC is directly funded by Greece, the same way similar Hellenic lobbies are funded in Canada and the United States. To that extent, the taxpayers of Germany and other EU countries should be made aware of what the bankrupt Greek state is spending their money on. Athens is waging an international anti-Macedonian culture war, and charging it to Europe's credit card," said UMD Voice Editor Mark Branov.



For more information, please visit the Australian Macedonian Weekly newspaper website by clicking HERE.

[George S.]

History





Phaedrus

http://www.knowledgerush.com/kr/encyclopedia/Phaedrus/

Phaedrus , Roman fabulist, was by birth a Macedonian and lived in the reigns of Augustus, Tiberius, Gaius and Claudius.

According to his own statement (prologue to book iii.), not perhaps to be taken too literally, he was born on the Pierian Mountain, but he seems to have been brought at an early age to Italy, for he mentions that he read a verse of Ennius as a boy at school. According to the heading of the chief manuscript he was a slave and was freed by Augustus. He incurred the wrath of Sejanus, the powerful minister of Tiberius, by some supposed allusions in his fables and was brought to trial and punished. We learn this from the prologue to the third book, which is dedicated to Eutychus, who has been identified with the famous charioteer and favourite of Gaius.

The fourth book is dedicated to Particulo, who seems to have dabbled in literature. The dates of their publication are unknown, but Seneca, writing between AD 41 and 43 (Consol. ad Polyb. 27), knows nothing of Phaèdrus, and it is probable that he had published nothing then. His work shows little or no originality; he simply versified in iambic trimeters the fables current in his day under the name of "Aesop," interspersing them with anecdotes drawn from daily life, history and mythology. He tells his fable and draws the moral with businesslike directness and simplicity; his language is terse and clear, but thoroughly prosaic, though it occasionally attains a dignity bordering on eloquence. His Latin is correct, and, except for an excessive and peculiar use of abstract words, shows hardly anything that might not have been written in the Augustan age. From a literary point of view Phaedrus is inferior to Babrius, and to his own imitator, La Fontaine; he lacks the quiet picturesqueness and pathos of the former, and the exuberant vivacity and humour of the latter. Though he frequently refers to the envy and detraction which pursued him, Phaedrus seems to have attracted little attention in antiquity. He is mentioned by Martial (iii. 20, 5), who imitated some of his verses, and by Avianus. Prudentius must have read him, for he imitates one of his lines (Prud. Cath. vii. 115; ci. Phaedrus, iv. 6, 10).

The first edition of the five books of Phaedrus was published by Pithou at Troyes in 1596 from a manuscript now in the possession of the marquis of Rosanbo. In the beginning of the 18th century there was discovered at Parma a manuscript of Perotti (1430-1480), archbishop of Siponto, containing sixty-four fables of Phaedrus, of which some thirty were new. These new fables were first published at Naples by Cassitto in 1808, and afterwards (much more correctly) by Jannehli in 1809. Both editions were superseded by the discovery of a much better preserved manuscript of Perotti in the Vatican, published by Angelo Mai in 1831. For some time the authenticity of these new fables was disputed, but they are now generally accepted, and with justice, as genuine fables of Phaedrus. They do not form a sixth book, for we know from Avianus that Phaedrus wrote five books only, but it is impossible to assign them to their original places in the five books. They are usually printed as an appendix.

In the middle ages Phaedrus exercised a considerable influence through the prose versions of his fables which were current, though his own works and even his name were forgotten. Of these prose versions the oldest existing seems to be that known as the "Anonymus Nilanti," so called because first edited by Nilant at Leiden in 1709 from a manuscript of the 13th century. It approaches the text of Phaedrus so closely that it was probably made directly from it. Of the sixty-seven fables which it contains thirty are derived from lost fables of Phaedrus. But the largest and most influential of the prose versions of Phaedrus is that which bears the name of Romulus. It contains eighty-three fables, is as old as the 10th century, and seems to have been based on a still earlier prose version, which, under the name of "Aesop," and addressed to one Rufus, may have been made in the Carolingian period or even earlier. About this Romulus nothing is known. The collection of fables in the Weissenburg (now Wolfenbüttel) manuscript is based on the same version as Romulus. These three prose versions contain in all one hundred distinct fables, of which fifty-six are derived from the existing and the remaining forty-four presumably from lost fables of Phaedrus. Some scholars, as Burmann, Dressier and L Muller, have tried to restore these lost fables by versifying the prose versions.

The collection bearing the name of Romulus became the source from which, during the second half of the middle ages, almost all the collections of Latin fables in prose and verse were wholly or partially drawn. A 12th century version of the first three books of Romulus in elegiac verse enjoyed a wide popularity, even into the Renaissance. Its author (generally referred to since the edition of Nevelet in 1610 as the "Anonynius Neveleti") was long unknown, but Hervieux has shown grounds for identifying him with Walther of England, chaplain to Henry II and afterwards archbishop of Palermo.

Another version of Romulus in Latin elegiacs was made by Alexander Neckam, born at St Albans in 1157. Amongst the collections partly derived from Romulus the most famous is probably that in French verse by Marie de France. About 1200 a collection of fables in Latin prose, based partly on Romulus, was made by the Cistercian monk Odo of Sherrington; they have a strong medieval and clerical tinge. In 1370 Gerard of Minden wrote a poetical version of Romulus in Low German.

Since Pithou's edition in 1596 Phaedrus has been often edited and translated; among the editions may be mentioned those of Burmann (1718 and 1727), Bentley (1726), Schwabe (1806), Berger de Xivrey (1830), Orelli (1832), Eyssenhardt (1867), L Müller (1877), Rica (1885), and above all that of L Havet (Paris, 1895). For the medieval versions of Phaedrus and their derivatives see L Roth, in Philologus, i. 523 seq.; E Grosse, in Jahrb. f. class. Philol., cv. (1872); and especially the learned work of Hervieux, Les Fabulistes latins depuis le siecle d'Auguste jusqu'a la fin du moyen Age (Paris, 1884), who gives the Latin texts of all the medieval imitators (direct and indirect) of Phaedrus, some of them being published for the first time.

This entry was originally from the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.

Here's a book on Phaedrus- http://books.google.com/books?id=MYA...donian&f=false - which you can read in full.



Posted by TrueMacedonian

[George S.]

Stories





FEEDBACK: RE: The article "More On The Hyksos-Israelites" -By A Digest Reader (September's Digest)


Risto, I found this article quite interesting but there are some things I don't agree with.

Here are some of my own suggestions:

.The Egyptian Hieroglyphic Script & The Egyptian Hieratic Script.

The Egyptian Hieratic Script was invented and developed more or less at the same time as the Hieroglyphic Script and was used in parallel with it for everyday purposes such as keeping records and accounts and writing letters.

The Egyptians were already using both of these scripts when the Hyksos-Israelites first arrived in Lower Egypt at approximately 1800 BC.

*'Although Hebrew is a derivative of the ancient Egyptian language', it is possible that the Hyksos-Israelites were not quite so wedded to the writing systems employed in Thebes (Egypt); and through their many contacts with neighbouring countries to the north and east they would often come into contact with alternative alphabets and languages that were substantially easier to learn and use.


.The Egyptian Demotic Script.

The more cursive Egyptian Demotic Script or popular script, a name given to it by Herodotus, developed from a northern variant of the Hieratic script in around 660 BC. The Egyptians themselves called it 'sekh shat' (writing for documents).

The "Egyptian Demotic (popular) Script" is not Hebrew writing.



By Vidan




FEEDBACK: RE: The article "PROTO-SLAVIC WRITING" -By Bogdan T (August's Digest)





Risto, I'd like to add to this piece if I may.



If we took a ride in Tito's Time Machine and stopped in the year 1700 BC, we would find an array of proto-Slavic tribes settled in many coastal lands around the Mediterranean. Over time the proto-Slavic tribes had developed and used different forms of writing systems to record their somewhat diverging but still related languages.



.The proto-Slavs on the island of Crete used pictorial symbols (pre-Linear A) to record their language.



.The proto-Slav Pelasgians at Morea (modern day Peloponnesus) would have used proto-Cyrillic (phonetic) characters.

.They also may well have used a writing system dubbed "strokes and incisions".



*It is debatable as to where the Hyksos-Israelites originally came from. Apart from those settled in Lower Egypt, many, also, may well have been scattered all over the southern Mediterranean at this time and they began to have a linguistic influence on the proto-Slavs in the region.



.Linear A is said to have first appeared on the island of Crete around 1650 BC. There are those who say that the language recorded by Linear A was Semitic.



Continued.....



I don't entirely agree with the content in the article "Phoroneus & The Paleo-Phoenician Script and Language (Scota and Gaedel -part 16)" -Macedonian Digest #39, but there are some interesting points. Risto, your readers may want to take another look at this article.



.The Hyksos-Israelites took the proto-Cyrillic Script off the Pelasgians at Morea and brought it back down to Lower Egypt.



.The Pelasgian Script then became the basis for the Paleo-Phoenician Script (and still the later Phoenician Script).



*Paleo-Phoenicians = A fusion of Hyksos-Israelites & proto-Slavs.



.Linear A was superseded by the more sophisticated Linear B Script. The language recorded by Linear B would also have been Semitic, or part there of.



.The early "Israelites" adopted the Phoenician Script in the 11th century BC (not the Linear A - or - B Scripts).



.The "Greeks" swapped scripts from Linear B to the Phoenician alphabet around the 9th century BC, but maintained their language.



*9th Century Greeks = A fusion of proto-Slav Pelasgians/Hyksos-Israelites/Nubians (Ethiopians)/Egyptians/Phoenicians/etc



By Vidan



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Risto, I don't entirely agree with the content in this article and some of the wording in it.



The article implies that there was an "Ancient Greek" ethnicity when there never was one. The citizens of the Ancient City States were a mixture/fusion of indigenous proto-Slav Pelasgians, Hyksos-Israelite colonists/exiles, Nubian (Ethiopian) exiles, Egyptian exiles, Phoenicians, and so on. The title doesn't make sense. If anyone stole anything it was the Hyksos-Israelites, whom adopted many aspects of "White Egyptian" culture.



By Vidan