The fallacious choice between freedom and avoiding starvation. This has got to be the con of the century.

I remember one man (a Macedonian - if you could call him one) in the early 90's attempting to justify his opposition to Macedonian independence by claiming Macedonians would starve because they did not have a pork industry. According to him, pork was imported from Serbia at the time and we needed our "brothers" for survival.

His argument was quite idiotic, but worse, it was a sad display of the lengths that people will go to - even at their own humiliating expense - to resist Macedonians exercising their natural rights.

[QUOTE=Buktop;71623]Actually yes, if it wasn't for the embargo, not only would the Macedonians still have their name and flag, but they would have had a decent life, a decent wage, decent health care, decent education etc... Do you not see that the Embargo is the cause of the capitulation? [/QUOTE]
They don't have a decent wage, decent health care, decent education etc... now. So it is safe to assume the capitulation was a waste of time.

So the limit of the suffering was quite modest and not really a test of Macedonian will at all. I hate to sound negative, but there is little to be proud of other than breaking away from Yugoslavia in our recent history.

What are the 'pros' to the Intermim Accord, Buktop?

Buktop, I disagree with that statement, look at Croatia for example they have a better life and higher wages but they owe 45 billion euros in foreign debt which means they are not free at all. Risto is right, capitulation is simply not worth it and we are controlled by fear and manipulation. I still think that SDSM did so much damage to our country that it will take even more years just for us to be functioning as a normal country.

Even if there was no embargo with an incompetent SDSM party lead by the biggest criminals at the time, our country would still be the same today with that negative style of leading. You cant have communists who ruled our country on the back of the peoples hard work, leading a new democratic regime with the same old communist style it was never going to work whichever way you looked at it.

Buktop, Look at where we are today, we are forced to rebuild and renovate hospitals and health clinics from scratch, we are forced to build new roads and freeways,new rail line,new energy plants and factories this not only costs billions of euros it takes alot of time and effort. We didnt even have a sports hall up until recently we had an old stadium where we could barely host an international football match, its sad that in this day and age 2010 we have to build just to have the basic things that any normal country has. Do you realize that our citizens ride on buses that are over 50 years old? With no heating,Air Conditioning nothing, for the first time in many decades we are getting new buses from Ukraine and China.

[QUOTE=Prolet;71666]Buktop, Rogi is right, our oil came via Romania and Bulgaria when there was a Greek Embargo. Serbia got the majority of its oil from Russia via Romania in the Black Sea. SDSM Deputy Leader Zoran Zaev made a fortune from all this, not only that but from Cigarette sales too.[/QUOTE]

Prolet, Buktop is making it up as he goes along.

He is trying to convince you that 'we have no choice' that we 'have to negotiate' or that 'our hands are tied' because of the [B]supposed[/B] economic power that Greece has over us. In many ways he is defending Greek political interests here, by doing so.

What better way is there for Buktop to continue our vassal status than to misrepresent just how much economic power Greece has over Macedonia ! Think about whose interests he is working for here.

Don't believe his bullshit.

There has been an economic blockade of the country for 15 years now. I have an Uncle in Shtip who owns a small clothing factory. He stopped sending hats to Greece 15 years ago. His NEW MARKET is in Russia, and has never looked back.

Our growth story over the last 5 years or so, [B]has nothing to do with Greece[/B], but rather with regional powers such as Turkey, Slovenia, Roumania and the Ukraine opening factories in Macedonia and investing heavily in the little country.

You will have noticed that his use of the 'oil' and 'gas' figures have been intended to deceive people here about the actual power Greece has over Macedonia, economically.

Pelister, I do agree that things are improving alot for us and we can only hope for it to continue. We shouldnt be looking at eachother as enemies here, but rather learn from eachother on what needs to be done in order for these mistakes to never happen again. I think its time we stand up for ourselves and respect eachother because the others are not smarter then us.

We all know that Greece doesnt have energy resources, they dont produce Gas and Oil infact we give them electricity along with Albania. The Black Sea is used to transport Oil and Gas throughout Europe, alot of our Oil and Gas comes from Bulgaria Via Russia and now Serbia since their Blockade was lifted.

I dont blame Buktop for having that opinion but at the same time we dont need to gang up on him if we dont agree with his views. I think we can learn alot from eachother, we all view things differently, we come from different countries,societies and so forth there is no need to argue with eachother on certain things.

Education is something very important for us, we all learn something everyday and its time we stood up for ourselves because we are the only ones who can create our destiny, we are the only ones who can capitulate and destroy ourselves.

[QUOTE=Prolet;71666]Buktop, Rogi is right, our oil came via Romania and Bulgaria when there was a Greek Embargo. Serbia got the majority of its oil from Russia via Romania in the Black Sea. SDSM Deputy Leader Zoran Zaev made a fortune from all this, not only that but from Cigarette sales too.[/QUOTE]

Prolet, did you read my post? I know about the oil, I even went so far as to provide further evidence confirming this practice.

Corruption in this case was a direct result of the situation Greece put us in.

Do you know how much that oil cost to acquire from Bulgaria and Romania? "The effect of the blockade on oil prices has been
to increase the cost of transporting crude oil from $19 per ton to
$41.50 per ton." Geroski, pg. 13.

[QUOTE=Vangelovski;71672]The fallacious choice between freedom and avoiding starvation. This has got to be the con of the century.[/quote] I never said we were going to starve. Please feel free to ask me a question about the Economic impact of the embargo, come on, don't just ignore it with sweeping statements, indulge me in this argument, if only this one time, I would love you to try and prove me wrong.

[quote]I remember one man (a Macedonian - if you could call him one) in the early 90's attempting to justify his opposition to Macedonian independence by claiming Macedonians would starve because they did not have a pork industry. According to him, pork was imported from Serbia at the time and we needed our "brothers" for survival.

His argument was quite idiotic, but worse, it was a sad display of the lengths that people will go to - even at their own humiliating expense - to resist Macedonians exercising their natural rights.[/QUOTE]Nice story, but completely irrelevant.

Prolet you are right about education…now they are teaching people basic common decency on how to use a bus…those previous politicians have a lot of stagnation to answer for:16:.
[url]http://www.vest.com.mk/?ItemID=E267AD71167CF343B76E0A977927FE69[/url]

[QUOTE=Risto the Great;71674]They don't have a decent wage, decent health care, decent education etc... now. So it is safe to assume the capitulation was a waste of time.[/quote] And as I said Risto, it is a direct result of what happened between 1994-95. In effect, it took 10 years for the Macedonian economy to recover from this action, so right now, we are living at levels that should have been achieved in 2001. It is safe to say that the capitulation [U]prolonged[/U] the economic impact of the embargo.

[quote]So the limit of the suffering was quite modest and not really a test of Macedonian will at all. I hate to sound negative, but there is little to be proud of other than breaking away from Yugoslavia in our recent history.[/QUOTE]The suffering was not at all modest, as the effects of it are still felt today, and are directly related to our current precarious position.

You may be right, there may be nothing to be proud of. But I see a country that, after 20 years of blackmail, burglary and prejudice against it, has managed to survive. We are a very stubborn people, and no army, country, nation, or god has been able to wipe us from the earth.