All these days we see a marathon of the greek government to achieve an agreement between herself and the Forme Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia over the name of this country. Both sides are willing to finish with the issue for different issues. While FYROM wants to be invited to join the NATO and so it has to find a solution in order to avoid a greek veto, Greece wants to close an issue that provoked so many problems to her foreign policy. Even though from both sides many extremistes were declaring that Macedonia is Greek or Macedonia is Macedonian I believe that tha majority of the people in both sides clearly understand that the issue of the name is too trivial to cause such great problems. For Greece this story is like a greek tragedy while after so many years of indifference over the issue she faced a non convinient for her reality after the declaration of Macedonia as an indipendant state - even though all these years before, Greece recognized the Republic of Macedonia within the Yugoslavian Federation. I dont want to present the history of the dispute between the two countries. What is important now at this very moment of negotiation is not the name of FYROM. Greece finally understood that she hasnt a monopoly of the name Macedonia because of the ancient legacy. Nobody who knows history in this planet believes that the inhabitants of FYROM are connected to Alexander's kingdom. What we have to understand is that Macedonia is not something that belongs only to one people. Macedonia is rich of multinational coexistance and culture during the Byzantine and Ottoman era, where Serbians, Slavmacedonians, Bulgarians, Jews, Albanians, Greek and Turks lived together. So the name Macedonia means a lot of things to all of these people. So, FYROM has to accept a solution which of course involve the term Macedonia but with a remark that they are not the only Macedonians in the region. Every people in this planet has the right to self -determination so the Macedonians of FYROM. But this right must not insult other nations in order to co-exist in harmony. As a result in order to become a member of NATO and the EU, FYROM has to renounce any possible territorial claim over her neighbours (Greece and Bulgaria) something which is vital for the stability in the region.
The ''Greek'' Files
When constructing the blog it was not in my intentions to open a section over greek history but as I have seen from your comments and posts it is a nessecity in order to keep the other section - ''debate on democracy'' clean of stuff that is not related to the issue. Here you can post whatever you want and debate on every issue related to greek history and international problems connected with Greece. The only thing I want to mention is that debate on history must be on the principles of scientificism. Send me your posts in my email g_kokkolis@yahoo.gr and I will upload them in the blog.Wednesday, March 19 2008
Enough with the name of Macedonia!
By Giorgos on Wednesday, March 19 2008, 02:53
Tuesday, February 26 2008
Turning point in Cyprus...Is the problem to be solved ?
By Giorgos on Tuesday, February 26 2008, 19:22
On Sunday something changed to Cyprus...For the first time a communist candidate was elected President of the Republic..his name Dimitris Xristofias of the AKEL party..For sure this change means a lot of things not only for the free part of the island but also for the nothern -occupied by Turkey- part. Turkish Cypriots are waiting for a solution which now seems to be closer than before since Papadopoulos is no longer in power...however they all know that Cristofia's election was a result of Papadopoulos support which probably means a lot on how will the new president try to reach an agreement with the Turkish Cypriots. However Turkish cypriotic medias covered the issue mentioning that the obstacle of Papadopoulos was overpassed. Mehmet Ali Talat mentioned something very important according to my point of view..that it is urgent for Greek Cypriots to understand that Turkish Cypriotic community is politically equal to the Greek Cypriotic in this island. Personally I agree with this..as long as we dont forget that 27% cannot govern the 73% of the people..and that a state, member of the European Union doesnt need protector states let alone a turkish army in the nothern part..an army of a candidate country which does not recognize a member state..
Friday, January 11 2008
New Year, an Olympic one. New China ? New Olympics? I don't think so..
By Giorgos on Friday, January 11 2008, 00:10
Happy New Year everyone!
This year 2 things are going to attract the globe : the American presidential election on November 2008 and the 29th Summer Olympics in Beijing, China. The 8th of August at 8 p.m 2008 we are going to watch the Opening Ceremony of the Beijing Olympic Games and as the creator of the ceremony inform us it is going to present us the chinese culture and history and with them the environmental problems we have to deal with. All these in 2008, the year that China will be the first country to emit Co2 surpassing the amount of the US pollution. China wants to use the Olympics to show the world that is here to stay. Also the cost to organise the Olympics is getting bigger as years pass, making it impossible for smaller countries to host them. Those who believed that the Athens Games would give a spirit in the organisation soon found that sponsorships were bigger than thos of Sydney 2000. However Greece managed to host secure Games and presented an Opening Ceremony which was very different of what we had seen before and was regarded as one of the best one ever. But it didnt manage to change them.. Now it is expected the opposite: while in 2004 all the people expected that with the return to their birthplace the Olympics would change, in 2008 Olympics are expected to change China. But is it going to happen ? Will China change its political system and give more freedoms? Or will things going to get better with Thibet and Taiwan ? Will the Red Dragon decide to adopt a model of green economical development ? I dont think so...While all these happen voices worldwide and especially in Greece believe that the Olympics are nothing more than a big party of politicians, athletes and sponsors and they have nothing to do with the Ancient Games and the romantic era of the Modern Games. Is the Olympic movement on decline? How all these dopping scandals and economic relations with sponsors reflect on its image? Is there any hope to restore their previous glory, or the Olypmic movement today reflects a small image of our world ? A world were money, enterprises and illegal drugs are above human beings ?
Monday, November 26 2007
Fighting for a historical relic..the modern Macedonian Question
By Giorgos on Monday, November 26 2007, 16:03
When reffering to Macedonia is very difficult to define of what are you talking about : is Macedonia a georgaphical term, is it a nation and why for eons all these Balkan people fight for this piece of land? Lets split the timeline in three periods..The first one is the ancient era, where Macedonia means an indipendent state ruled by Phillip II and after him Alexander the Great. This state consider of itself to be a part of the greek world. Macedonia shares the same language,culture, religion and joins every pan-hellenic event as for example the Olympic Games. This state under the rule of Alexander united almost all the greek city states and declared war to the Persian Empire. The second period begins from the Roman times and continues to the Byzantine Empire (or Eastern Roman Empire) and her succesor in the area the Ottoman Empire. All this time which is almost 19 centuries Macedonia is called the geographical region of the ancient kingdom which now was a province of all these empires. After Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia became indipendent they all wanted to gain the region of Macedonia because of her strategical and economical importance and because they all had people of the same nation who inhabited Macedonia. During the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913 the united Balkan allies captured Macedonia and with the Bucharest Treaty of 1913 the Ottoman Empire was forced to cede the region to the allies. Greece and Serbia controlled almost the 95 % of the former ottoman region but Greece had the biggest part which also included the capital of the region Thessalonica. The decades following the creation of Yugoslavia under the king Alexander III Karageorgevitc the region of Serbian Macedonia was named Vardaska which means the land of the Vardar river. After Tito came to power and made Yugoslavia a federal stated he changed the name and made it Peoples republic of Macedonia while he cultivated a Macedonian national identity. After the collapse of Yugoslavia the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia declared it's independance and changed her name into Macedonia. This goes to the third period...Macedonia tried to convince the globe that they were the same nation as ancient Macedonia and of course they claimed that Alexander was also a Macedonian. Following that they used the royal emblem of Alexander as their flag and in their school books they claimed that Macedonia was under Greek and Bulgarian occupation. After Greece outrageously rejected all these, there was a negotiation process where F.Y.R.O.M. accepted to join the UN under the name former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and was forced to changed her flag and every territorial claim over the Greek region of Macedonia. All this history is needed to understand why Greeks have emotional reasons of not accepting Macedonia as the name of this country. If we take in mind that much of the greek nationalism is based on Alexander's Macedonia and that nowadays Greece owes almost the 90% of the ancient Macedonia and a huge part of the Ottoman Macedonia then we can understand the sensitivity of the issue. However, the Greeks dont have the exclusivity to the term which is geographical and is vital for FYROM's stability in the interior.Of course this doesn't mean that FYROM or any other country have the right to exclusively use the name of a region - and especially Macedonia which is important for all Balkan people. Personally, I would like in the name of the neighbouring country to be defined that this country is not the whole of Macedonia -which is after all a georgaphical term- but a part of it f.e. Nothern Macedonia, or Slavian Macedonia et.c. Furthermore FYROM must stop fabricating historical facts over ancient Macedonia. In conclusion, the former Minister of Foreign Affairs of FYROM when interviewed said : Of course we have no relation with Ancient Macedonia, but when in Balkans in order to proof a different national existance you have to present history we were forced by you (the Greeks) to fabricate our history.....