Foreign press on the Macedonian issue

[Tsontos]

This thread is reserved for foreign (non-Greek and non-FYROM based) news articles, in English, regarding the Macedonian naming dispute and developments in FYROM.

[Tsontos]

From Balkaninsight.com:

France Backs Greece In Macedonia Row

14 March 2008 Brussels

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has confirmed he backs Greece in the row over Macedonia’s name.

On the margins of the European Union summit, Sarkozy said it was “the right impression” to conclude that that Paris is on Greek side in the “name” dispute.

He also confirmed the issue is always raised during various meetings with Greek Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis.

“I always stressed that we support the Greek position in the name issue. Greeks are our friends,” Sarkozy said.

“I am confirming to you that we are in solidarity with the position of our Greek friends,” the French president said.

http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/8630/


From the International Herald Tribune:

Austria: Greek, FYR Macedonian officials meet over name dispute

March 17, 2008
VIENNA, Austria: The decades-old name dispute between Greece and FYR Macedonia can be resolved, but could also lead to conflict if not cleared up soon, a U.N. envoy said Monday.

Matthew Nimetz said he was "more optimistic" after a closed-door meeting Monday with Greek and FYR Macedonian officials in Vienna.

"There's a lot that has to get done, but this is an issue that should be resolved," he said.

"One has to be somewhat optimistic that the leadership in both countries will see the importance of getting this behind us — and also the great risks if we don't get it behind us," Nimetz said.

The dispute has sullied Greek-FYR Macedonian relations for 17 years, with Greece arguing that its neighbor's name implies territorial claims on Greece's own northern province, also called Macedonia.

For its part, Greece refers to the neighboring country as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, the name also used on an interim basis by the United Nations and other international organizations.

Athens has threatened to scuttle FYR Macedonia's bid to the European Union if it refuses to reach a mutually acceptable solution.

The U.N. has long supervised talks over the issue, but the effort has acquired greater urgency following Kosovo's declaration of independence and Greek threats to block FYR Macedonia's bid to join NATO unless the dispute is resolved.

FYR Macedonia is expected to be invited join NATO at an alliance summit on April 2-4, and Nimetz noted that resolving the name dispute was important to NATO countries.

Nimetz has proposed five alternative names that FYR Macedonia could consider adopting: Constitutional Republic of Macedonia, Democratic Republic of Macedonia, Independent Republic of Macedonia, New Republic of Macedonia and Republic of Upper Macedonia.

Nimetz said neither side had "truly accepted" his suggestions, but declined to disclose what they said, saying only that he had invited both to come to New York for further talks next week.

Before Monday's talks, Greek Defense Minister Vangelis Meimarakis said Athens had made its position "very clear."

"The other side must also take the necessary steps to reach a compromise," he said. "Otherwise, it will bear the full responsibility."

On Saturday, FYR Macedonian Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski told state-run news agency MIA that adding an adjective to the country's name was a "useless debate," as that Greece has rejected the proposals FYR Macedonia would accept.

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/...me-Dispute.php

[Truth Bearer]

Macedonia Hopes to End Name Row With Greece
Crvenkovski accused Greece of abusing its NATO membership to impose a solution.


Reuters photo: www.president.gov.mk Macedonia hopes within weeks to resolve a dispute with Greece over its name, so as to ease its entry into the NATO military alliance.
Greece has threatened to veto Macedonia's entry to the U.S.-led group unless Macedonia changes its name, which is the same as that of Greece's northernmost province.

"There are only two weeks to the (NATO) summit, that is a very short time and I honestly hope that this problem will be overcome," Macedonian President Branko Crvenkovski told a news conference during a visit to EU president Slovenia on Tuesday.

Crvenkovski said Macedonia was working on a "reasonable compromise" to end the 17-year-old name dispute, adding a name that did not hurt its national identity would be acceptable. But he said Macedonia was "not ready to accept a dictate from Athens", accusing Greece of abusing its NATO membership to impose a solution.

Macedonia hopes an April 2-4 NATO summit will invite it to join the 26-member military alliance alongside Croatia and Albania, whose invitations were agreed in principle in March.

"Macedonia expects membership invitation, all members of the alliance believe that Macedonia fulfils all criteria for NATO membership, the only problem left is a bilateral problem with neighbour Greece regarding the name of our country," he added.

Skopje uses the name Macedonia in bilateral ties with the United States, Russia, China and Canada but at the United Nations it is called "The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia." NATO and EU also use the acronym FYROM.

U.N. envoy Matthew Nimetz has been shuttling between Skopje and Athens to broker an agreement. Diplomats have said he had proposed five possible variants on Macedonia's name.

Crvenkovski also said Macedonia hoped to get a date for starting accession talks with the European Union by the end of this year and to conclude talks on liberalising a visa agreement with the EU as well.

Slovenian President Danilo Turk told the same news conference the name dispute was a bilateral issue that should not weigh on Macedonia's accession to the EU.

http://www.javno.com/en/world/clanak.php?id=133013

[Tsontos]

From the FinancialTimes:

FYR Macedonia ready to bend on name dispute

By Neil MacDonald in Skopje

Published: March 16 2008 16:22 | Last updated: March 16 2008 16:22

The FY Republic of Macedonia says it will bend as far as necessary in its protracted “name dispute” with Greece in return for a Nato membership invitation at the alliance’s Bucharest summit at the beginning of next month.

Matthew Nimitz, the United Nations mediator, holds last-ditch talks with the two sides in Vienna on Monday in search of a name for the former Yugoslav republic, whose current name the Greeks say implies territorial aspirations on their own northern province, also called Macedonia.

The Balkan identity battle has gained fresh urgency because Greece, a long-time alliance member, threatens to veto Nato entry for the weaker, ethnically volatile neighbouring country. Greek stubbornness - rather than FYR Macedonia’s latest inter-ethnic internal crisis - could throw off the whole western strategy for stabilising the shaky region in the wake of Kosovo’s February 17 declaration of independence from Serbia, officials in Skopje warn.

Nikola Dimitrov, FYR Macedonia’s coordinator for Nato accession and chief negotiator in the name dispute, told the Financial Times: “On one side we have our identity - a line we can’t cross. And on the other side, we have Nato membership. Within those lines, we’re going to do whatever we can to resolve this last remaining issue with Greece.”

Mr Nimitz last month proposed five different name modifications without achieving a breakthrough. Amid intensified shuttling by Nato and EU diplomats in the past week, Skopje appeared amenable to “Democratic Republic of Macedonia”, while ruling out the only suggestion Athens would accept, “Republic of Upper Macedonia”.

The difference boils down to free use of the adjective “Macedonian” - especially as Skopje’s dignitaries mount the stage at the Nato summit on April 2. But if the dispute drags on, Athens could endanger Skopje’s eventual accession to the European Union.

The Greek government elected last year has made a U-turn from a previous deal whereby Skopje could apply to international organisations under the temporary name Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, or FYROM, Mr Dimitrov said.

”The veto policy is new. It goes against the accord signed between the two countries in 2005, and in that context it’s not legal. It’s also against the interest of the Nato alliance and the alliance’s values,” he said.

Nato and EU membership are vital security goals for the ex-Yugoslav country of 2m people, desperate for economic growth and wracked by tensions between ethnic FYR Macedonians and a sizable ethnic Albanian minority of roughly 25 per cent closely tied to Kosovo and Albania.

While “Euro-Atlantic” aspirations unite the two ethnic groups, the government of Nikola Gruevski, the centre-right prime minister, must overcome qualms about any name change among the overwhelming bulk of ethnic FYR Macedonians.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9148b682-f...0779fd2ac.html

[Vasiliye]

Nikola Dimitrov's father, an "Aegean", Prof. Dimitar Dimitrov is one of the most prolific high-brow Bulgarian nationalists in FYROM, as a publicist.He was the only open Bulgarian as a Minister in 1998-2002.Is there a case of father v. son rebellion or what?It just show how identity a concept which they simply fail to grasp and its declaration is more a result of factors from outside (peer-pressure, education, personal protest, convenience), something like memebership in a sport team fan or political party, rather than something genuine with a tradition.............clearly "nothing follows" from the situation, Nikola is no more tied to his father's Bulgarism no more than he can be accused of, say, a crime Dimitrov Senior commits.................but as I stated, the entire concept of DPMNEism is mainly "Cryptobulgarism" with the mask of "Macedonism"....................Todor Alexandrov and Ivan Mihailov (VMRO-DPMNE official site claims succession from them) used to fight for "Independent Macedonia", sometimes even giving anti-Sofia statements, simply to leave an impression that they are not irredentist, while they stated that they are Bulgarians, elsewhere......

[Tsontos]

Vasiliye, if the DPMNE does have crypto-Bulgarian tendancies, why is it necessary for Nikola to completely reject his father's 'identity'?

[Truth Bearer]

Greece rejects Macedonian NATO entry in name row

Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer expressed hope that a solution will be found until the Bucharest summit. Greece stood firm and refused to allow Macedonia to join the NATO military alliance until a row over its name, that has festered for more than 17 years, has been resolved. As NATO foreign ministers considered whether to hand membership invitations to Macedonia, Albania and Croatia next month, Greek Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyannis said her country could only back two of the candidates.


“Greece supports the candidacy of Albania and Croatia,” she said, but added that “issues which are intertwined do not allow us to take the same position” for Macedonia. She told reporters at NATO headquarters that “nobody likes vetoes” and underlined that “Greece will continue to work in a constructive spirit for a mutually acceptable solution.”

According to NATO officials and diplomats, the so-called Adriatic Three have all largely met the technical criteria to join the 26-national transatlantic alliance. But Greece is blocking Macedonia because its name is the same as a northern Greek province. NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer underscored that the military alliance is a consensus organisation that works on unanimity, and that Greece had the upper hand as a member nation. “There´s an ally, Greece, and a non ally, Macedonia,” he
said after the informal talks. “NATO works by consensus”. “I hope that between now and Bucharest we will find a solution,” he said, referring to the Romanian capital where the April 2-4 summit will be held.

The Macedonia name dispute has become an unlikely obstacle to the alliance´s expansion. “I would like all three countries to join,” German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said. But he warned: “A lot depends on the question of whether these two states are going to be able to come closer together in the coming weeks.”

More than 10,000 people protested in northern Greece on the eve of the meeting, some holding Greek flags and yelling: “Macedonia is Greek”. Macedonia meanwhile placed a two-page advert in The Times of London newspaper, listing 30 reasons why it would make a good NATO member and insisting that it should not have to change its name.

Macedonia´s constitutional name is “Republic of Macedonia”, and Skopje wants this used in international relations, except with Athens, where a name acceptable to both parties could be used. Albania, Croatia and Macedonia are members of NATO´s
Membership Action Plan (MAP), which is designed to help aspiring countries meet NATO standards and prepare for membership.



Fonte: Seeurope.Net

[Truth Bearer]

U.S. vows to support Macedonia's NATO bid

www.chinaview.cn 2008-03-18 05:08:42

TIRANA, March 17 (Xinhua) -- An American lawmaker said on Monday that Macedonia had made progress on its way to join NATO, reiterating that the United States would help it achieve its aspirations.

"Macedonia represents a factor of stability and democracy in this region," said David Price, chairman of U.S. House of Representatives Democracy Assistance Commission.

Price, who heads a visiting U.S. Congress delegation to Macedonia, said that Europe would not have true stability and universal democracy until Balkan conflicts are resolved.

He expressed his hope that the name dispute between Macedonia and its southern neighbor Greece will not stand in the way of its NATO accession, and that a friendly solution will be found out to the issue.

Macedonia and Greece is being engaged in talks on Monday in Vienna over the name dispute which broke out shortly between Macedonia and Greece after Macedonia gained independence from Yugoslavia in 1991.

Greece has said the country's name, the Republic of Macedonia, implies a territorial claim over the northern Greek province of Macedonia and could destabilize the region.

Instead, it asks Macedonia to use the name of "Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" or FYROM, in short, under which the country joined the United Nations in 1993.

Greece has threatened to use its NATO-member status to veto Macedonia's accession efforts at the NATO's April 2-4 summit in Bucharest, Romania, if there is no agreement on the name issue by then.


Editor: Mu Xuequan

[Vasiliye]

Because Bulgarian from the fictional outline known as Geographic Macedonia want to emphasize their peculiar, specific symbolic bond with that space, exclusive regardless of demographic, political and other reality.Does a statement "I am a Macedonia and I desire my household in Lerin, confiscated by the Greek occupiers of Macedonia" sounds more pleasant to the ear of bleeding-heart influential liberal then something of "I am a Bulgarian and I want my household in rightfully rejoined to the core of Greece Makedonia" type.

I have a paper to submit to a London journal about that theme: the dissimulation of many "Macedonians".

As far Nikola Dimitrov goes, I do not claim that anybody is obliged or has some inherited quality to follow his fathers political and other conviction.There are "Macedonisms" and "Macedonism" as far as carbon copies goes.Nikola's children/Dimitar's grandson may switch to being Serbophilles or Greacophilles.But I am not making a point by parody here.

By far the most people believe that they are just that, "Makedonci", many of them to the core, bu few intellectuals understand that being a nominal "Macedonian", while remaining a factual Bulgarian puts his aspiration in favor in front of the foreign factor. Aspirations towards Macedonia made directly parallel with explicit Bulgarism was not convenient even in Ottoman times, let alone now when voters have being taught (in a different manner, from a different perspective) that they are non-Bulgarians. Futility of such "in your face" approach towards the people inside has been already seen.

VMRO-DPMNE, under Gruevski the Clever is precisely purging the society of the more vocal Bulgarians, knowing that their sweeping under carpet and making sure that they are loudless in these closing hours, is to make a face of "people's confidence in one's own identity".Again, I do claim that there is a significant fraction of Cryptobulgarians in the upper echelons of DPMNE and I'll substantiate it later.

Finally, isn't Georgievski's case illustrative ?The guy isn't stupid and he certainly did not become full fledged Bulgarian at middle age, by say, discovering a book or browsing website and decided that all of his talk of "United Macedonia with Pirin free from the Tartar occupiers" was just his early days naivete as a young politician and this is only a very recent private decision?Politics everywhere is composed from people who know better and in what passes for "democracy" today they may use it to manipulate the sheep.

[Tsontos]

An Al-Jazeera report on the Macedonian naming dispute:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45rk88d35Sk



From the website of the Greek Foreign Ministry, an interview of FM Ms. Bakoyannis with the German daily Süddeutsche Zeitung:

http://www.macedoniaontheweb.com/for...e-zeitung.html