Recently I heard of gruevski giving eurostyle farming subsidies. Will the society suckling on these new found funds cope with the withdrawal symptoms. Will leaving the negotiations signal a step away from the eu and hence put in question why is the eu giving Macedonia aid. The balancing act gruevski and Macedonia are being made to do reminds me of those Chinese circus performers getting into weird contortions on top of each other while balancing juggling and hopping on one foot all at the same time.
Im also reminded of Jankovskas running theme - its easy to be patriotic sitting out in the sideline thousands of kilometres away - and I might add my own bit to this of doing all this while chomping on a meat pie and watching the football. We have all done it. don’t get me wrong I don’t buy this we’re so poor stuff for one second vini vidi vici any illisuins but the underlying needs for infrastructure health reform and others which don’t look like they’ve been touched since the 60s or 70s still remain. Lets give gruevski a chance to playout his juggling act and also hope for him increasing the numbers in the un for recognition of our name. there always is time to say nah stick it up your jumper.:ninja:

Dammed spellchecker should be illusions

Macedonians in Australia seek recognition of constitutional name - paper
 

[url]http://www.mia.com.mk/default.aspx?vId=71851981&lId=2&pmId=501[/url]


Canberra, February 25 (MIA) - Macedonians living in Australia are eager for the Rudd Government to use them in advancing bilateral relations, saying there is much the two countries can offer each other. But what they would really like is for Australia to call the nation by its real name, reads Australian newspaper "The Canberra Times".

Washington-based president of the United Macedonian Diaspora, Metodija Koloski said being referred to as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia was not acceptable to his countrymen.

"‘We want Australia to recognise the Republic of Macedonia by its constitutional name, as have many other nations around the world", he said, adding, "using the acronym FYROM is offensive to us".

Koloski said relations between Australia and Macedonia were highly positive, but more could be done to progress them.

"The Australian Government agrees the relationship is healthy, but there appears to be no movement on recognising the name", reads the newspaper.

Koloski said that while personal relations were good between the Macedonian and Greek communities in Australia, he believed Greek hardliners had lobbied the Government to limit its recognition of his country.

"For its part, the Greek diaspora in Australia claim Macedonia is 'casting its dark veil of propaganda over the masses in campaigns of outright malevolence against the integrity and importance of Hellenic history in southern Europe'", states "The Canberra Times".

Last week, South Australian Premier Mike Rann inflamed tensions and sparked a diplomatic incident by suggesting that Macedonian President Gjorge Ivanov was dangerously stirring up trouble and trying to "steal Greek history and culture".

Macedonia's ambassador to Australia, Pero Stojanovski, told "The Canberra Times" the Macedonian Embassy in Canberra was not pleased with the abusive comments made by Rann and sent a formal protest to Australian PM Rudd and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, seeking formal explanation and apology with regards to the comment.

The 2006 Census recorded 83,978 Macedonians living in Australia. ik/fd/12:15

[url]http://www.mia.com.mk/default.aspx?vId=71868947&lId=2&pmId=501[/url]

German FM urges Macedonia's leadership to keep working on name row settlement

Berlin, February 25 (MIA) - Although not a simple matter for Macedonia, the country should keep working on settling the name row if it wishes to join the European Union and NATO. German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said Thursday in Berlin after meeting his Macedonian counterpart Antonio Milososki.

Germany believes the dispute should be resolved under the UN mediation.

At the moment I see no possibility for Germany to take part in resolving the matter, which is a subject of negotiation process at the UN under (Matthew) Nimetz mediation, Westerwelle said.

- I may only encourage both parties to take active part in settling the issue, Westerwelle said at the joint press conference with Milososki.

In spite of Greece's irrational hindering of Macedonia's accession to the EU, NATO, the country is ready for reaching a compromise, which may be written and understood in both Macedonian and Greek languages, Milososki said.

- Our talks with Nimetz have been constructive and we expect that our neighbours in Athens will also cooperate with us so that the two parties may resume the dialogue at the highest diplomatic, political level, Milososki said.

Greece is not offering concrete proposals at the moment, while Macedonia has certain ideas for both parties to make a step forward in the process for settling the dispute, which were also discussed with Nimitz during his visit to Skopje, Milososki said.

The Ministers expressed satisfaction with the development of bilateral relations, in particular with the economic cooperation

[url]http://www.mia.com.mk/default.aspx?vId=71865300&lId=2&pmId=501[/url]

Skopje blocks name row resolution - Greek MoFA's spokesman

Athens, February 25 (MIA) - Greece has demonstrated that it wants a solution, but Skopje is blocking efforts made for overcoming the bilateral name dispute, spokesman of Greece's Foreign Ministry Gregory Delavekouras stated Thursday ahead of tomorrow's visit by UN envoy Matthew Nimetz to Athens.

According to Delavekouras, the Macedonian Government "at the moment is very strong and has the opportunity to find a solution if it wants to." - Skopje refuses to negotiate about the essence of the issue, he said, reiterating that Athens pledged to settle the dispute with the establishment of one name for general use, that would include "a geographical determinant."

- We want a geographical determinant, because we cannot allow one part (of the geographical region of Macedonia) to represent the entire region, said Delavekouras.

He added that it was expected Nimetz to present the results of his recent visit to Macedonia and to be briefed on Greece's position on the matter at Friday's meeting with Alternate Foreign Minister Dimitris Droutsas in Athens.

Spokesman Delavekouras said Athens was hopeful that Macedonia would "act more constructively" in a bid to make headway regarding name row settlement, which would "pave the way to NATO and Europe" and to have Greece as friend while meeting these goals.

On Wednesday, Matthew Nimetz in Skopje after meeting with Macedonian Premier Nikola Gruevski stated that this was the right time to resolve the name issue, reiterating that he failed to bring any written documents.

- As you know over the years I've made a number of suggestions. I think a lot of those suggestions are still on the table and worthy of discussion and should be a part of a solution. The pieces of a solution are well known, but there's no complete solution, noted Nimetz

Wouldn't it be great if the macedonians in Australia could organize protests to happen in every capital city with a macedonian community and for all of these groups to protest at the exact same day and time.

It would get huge media attention and knock some sense into the idiot racist Australian politicians.

Julie, Do you have the link on the Canberra Times post?

Its a good article

Here's the article in PDF:

[url]http://www.macedoniancommunity.com/repository/macedoniacanberra.pdf[/url]

Rogi, Spolaj Ti mnogu

It is indeed a great article, lets hope this is the beginning of a new era for us.

I keep hearing the greeks want a geographical identifier before the name Macedonia.

Has anyone heard a suggestion by the greeks as to this proposal what would they then call the other 3 parts.
It sounds silly to have say a north Macedonia. The very word implies a south east and west. Has anyone heard anything. Has this question ever been asked of the greeks.