KING CONSTANTINE’S TELEGRAM - Part 09

The problem with the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia is so severe that it is unbelievable. I have faced many people, including Macedonians from other parts of Macedonia and from the Diaspora, who refuse to believe that a civilized and democratic Greece, which gave the world “everything” can behave in this manner. So, how does one defend themselves against this? Certainly not by keeping quiet; and this is what we have been doing since 1913 when Greece occupied and annexed part of our country.

I mentioned earlier that I went back to Greece in 2015, for the first time in 50 years since I left for Canada. I wish I had never gone back! I was so disappointed with what I saw. I was pretty sure the border guards would not allow me to go back but, just to humour my

relative who wanted to take me via the Greek-Macedonian border, or as some Macedonians call it the artificial Macedonian-Macedonian border, I went along. My relative asked me to stay in the car while he took my Canadian passport and presented it to the Greek border guard who looked bored sitting inside his booth. To my surprise the border guard just stamped the passport, without even looking at it, and tossed them back at my relative. “We are in…” he said and off we went. “They don’t care much about who comes in any more,” my relative said, “as long as they spend their money in Greece.”

So, I still don’t know if I am allowed to legally enter Greece or not...

The first thing I noticed after crossing the artificial border was the flat Macedonian plain that for so many years was the breadbasket of Greece, was almost all fallow… looking like it was abandoned. From the exterior the villages we passed looked identical to the villages in the Republic of Macedonia. Except the villages in Greek occupied Macedonia were almost empty and devoid of people. When we arrived in Lerin we saw not the city I knew, but an empty village, also devoid of people. When we asked where the people were, we were told “gone”. Gone where? “Gone!”

After that we took the road over Bigla towards Kostur and stopped in a of couple villages. The only people we found that were willing to speak to us were a couple of men who had lived in Toronto. I knew one of them.

We took a trip to my mother’s village and went to a café, which 50 years later looked exactly the same. I decided to take a picture to show my mother. A man sitting some distance in front of me put his hand over his face. I know what it is like to have your picture taken by a stranger and felt terrible for doing that to the man. But I wasn’t taking his picture. I was taking a picture of the café. When I got enough courage I got up, went over and asked the man if he understood Macedonian. He said yes and so I explained to him why I was taking the picture. My explanation made no difference; the man just shook his head and continued drinking his coffee and quietly conversing with his friend. It was too far away for me to tell what language they were speaking, as they were speaking quietly.

After that we went to my village where I was born, which I had not seen for 50 years. It was in ruins, I could not recognize it. I was so disappointed. We saw a total of 3 new houses existing throughout the ruins. A Macedonian family lived in one of those houses. I don’t know what kind of people lived in the other two.

As we entered the village in my relative’s car, we saw a couple of young ladies in two different houses doing laundry. The moment they saw the car approaching they disappeared inside.

We went to the house where the Macedonians lived and I knocked on the door. A long time later the young woman, who earlier was hanging clothes on the balcony, came out. I asked her if she could understand what I was saying in Macedonian. She said no!

I explained to her who we were and that we were originally from this village and were relatives of theirs. I asked to see her grandfather. She told me in Greek that he was not there. I don’t know if he was there or not but I got the feeling that I was not welcome. We left disappointed.

We went to Kostur and on our way back we stopped off in a village to have a cup of coffee. The place was dead quiet and the only person we spoke with was the waitress… we spoke to her in English.

When we came back to the Republic of Macedonia I made a point of mentioning to my relative the differences in the attitude between the villagers in Greek occupied Macedonia and those in the Republic of Macedonia. Being a stranger in town, everyone in Greek occupied Macedonia was mindful of your presence and was careful of how they conducted themselves in your presence whereas in the Republic of Macedonia the people were open and would converse with one another without any care. And if they did notice you and found out you were visiting from abroad, they were likely to invite you to their home for coffee. And that was the difference between our people who have been brought up under different regimes.

Also, let us not forget the so-called Greek Civil War and what that did to our people in Greece, about which we talked about in our last interview. Even though in reality the Macedonian people were unwitting pawns in a massive plot to get rid of the Macedonian people from Greek occupied Macedonia, in the eyes of the Greeks they were made to look like traitors trying to “steal” Macedonia from Greece… which stigmatized them badly, a guilty feeling the Macedonian people carry to this day. The Greeks still see them as perpetrators of a crime… a crime they never committed. Greek occupied Macedonia is still in Greek hands, the Macedonian people were driven out of Greece and permanently exiled just like Greece and its patrons wanted, and yet in the eyes of the Greek people the Macedonians are still the guilty party… And that hurts.

Unfortunately the world public perception is that Greece is a civilized democratic country and the Republic of Macedonia is a poor and democratically impoverished and backwards country. Who would have ever thought…?

INTERVIEWER – Very interesting... If you had the opportunity how would you change the situation for the Macedonians in Greece?

RISTO – The only way you can save those people, the ones that want to be saved, is to show them that there are many ways a person can live their lives. We who have left Greece a long time ago have forgotten how it was… not to be able to trust anyone you did not know… not to be able to speak Macedonian without checking around to make sure no one was listening… not to be able to say I am Macedonian or I come from Macedonia… not to be able to call yourself what your mother had named you at birth and not what the Greek priest named you at your baptism. I cannot even begin to tell you the kinds of choking restriction our people in Greece live under.

Change in Greece has to come from the inside. The Greek government must take the first step and recognize the Macedonian identity in Greece with full rights and privileges. It then has to fight against the century-old stigma and general Greek chauvinistic attitude towards the Macedonians, which may take generations to reverse.

Unfortunately I don’t see that happening in the near future unless there is tremendous pressure put on Greece from the outside. Greece must also, one, abandon the idea of “homogeneity” and two, its fear that its part of Macedonia is “somehow” going to be taken away from it by the “big bad Slavs”.

The most important thing for the Macedonians in Greek occupied Macedonia today is to survive as Macedonians and in order for them to do that; they need to know who they are.

Greece has failed to assimilate the Macedonian people on its territory because of the restrictions it has placed on them. On the one hand it wants to assimilate them and turn them into Greeks and on the other it does not trust them and thus is turning them into a second and even into a third class Greek citizen. No one appreciates being treated that way, especially not the Macedonians who are willing to give up their own precious Macedonian identity to become Greeks. Let me be clear about that here. To many Macedonian people these “neo-Greeks” are still “traitors” but, even so, the Greeks still will not give them a break and treat them as equals.

Still, change in Greece must come from the inside and all we can do today is highlight and publicize our problems with Greece. This way Greece can no longer hide behind its façade of being a civilized and democratic country and once discovered for what it is, it will have no choice but do one of two things. Recognize the Macedonians in Greece or be stigmatized by the world for the tyrant that it is.

But I have to tell you… I am really disappointed with Greece. It has done nothing to develop Greek occupied Macedonia. The place where I visited looked devastated and devoid of life. The villages are in ruins and the forests have been cut down. There is no movement or sign of progress anywhere. It is worse than it was many years ago. Greece has done nothing to develop it. It is so disappointing and on top of that Greece will not allow the Macedonian people born there to go back… not even for a visit. What are the Greeks afraid of? That these people might find a paradise? Greece has devastated their homeland! Nothing makes sense when it comes to Greece…

INTERVIEWER – Earlier you mentioned the stigma of the Greek Civil War and the effects it had on your people. Can you tell us a little more about that?

RISTO – Yes, the Greek Civil War. For reasons I mentioned in our last interview I don’t like to call it the “Greek Civil War” because first, it was not a “Civil War” and second it was not “Greek”. It should be appropriately named “The Macedonian genocide in Greece”. This was a “perpetrated” war to get rid of the Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia and it was done with outside help that involved Yugoslavia, Britain and the United States. But I am not going to talk about that here because enough was said, I believe, in our last interview. Here I am going to talk about what the war did to the Macedonian people inside and outside of Greece. To simplify the story I will speak only of the Macedonians living in Greece and the interactions between them.

As you know, mainstream history has completely neglected the Macedonian people. In fact, as you know, the Macedonian people, after Macedonia was invaded, occupied and partitioned in 1912, 1913 have been de-emphasized so much so that they “do not exist” for the Western world.

The Eastern world on the other hand, particularly Yugoslavia, has written its own version of the Macedonian people’s history, tailor made to fit its own political agendas. So the Macedonian people, from Greek occupied Macedonia in particular, have been left out and have suffered in silence for many years.

What I am going to tell you here is little known and hardly spoken outside of Macedonian circles.

It is hardly a secret that the Macedonian people are divided but very few people are aware what this division is and what it has done to them.

Even before Macedonia was annexed by Greece, Serbia, Bulgaria and Albania, the presence of foreign propaganda, propagated through the foreign schools and churches in Macedonia, created

divided loyalties among the Macedonian people which often came into collision.

After a part of Macedonia was annexed by Greece, some Macedonians accepted Greek dominion and became the “neo-Greeks”. Being Greeks, even “pretend” Greeks, they quickly gained advantages over their fellow Macedonians. This created friction between them.

These “neo-Greeks” were not some isolated groups existing somewhere far away; they were neighbours, a brother or a sister, or even a husband or a wife. They lived next door to one another or even inside one house.

The worst thing about these “assimilated” people was that they began to see themselves as “Greeks” and better than their Macedonian brethren. They began to look down on the Macedonians.

These neo-Greeks even began to lie to their children telling them that they were “Greeks, descendants from the Ancient Greeks” and that they had nothing to do with “natives” in this land. To avoid using the word “Macedonians” the Greeks and neo-Greeks called the Macedonian people “natives”. The Greek perception of these so-called “natives” was that somehow they were “foreigners”, “Slavs”, “Bulgarians”, “Gypsies”, and even agents of foreign powers that had somehow settled on ancient Greek lands.

The neo-Greeks were always in support of Greek governments and collaborated with the various Greek authoritative and repressive regimes. Many even acted as the eyes and ears for the police and other security services.

The degree of support for the Greek regime varied from mild to extreme. Those who were strongly dedicated to the Greek cause naturally were granted powers to act against the “natives”.

I need to mention here that these “neo-Greeks” or “Grkomani” (Greco-philes) as the Macedonians called them, were a very small number in proportion to the rest of the Macedonian population.

In conflict situations between individuals from the two groups, the Greek authorities always took the side of the neo-Greeks.

Greece over the years, up until WW II, was a very repressive state and consistently persecuted and abused the Macedonian people as well as the progressive elements in that country.

Then, after Nazi Germany invaded Greece, the Greek repressive regimes suddenly collapsed and before the occupiers had a chance to take control, a communist regime came into existence and leveled the playing field between the neo-Greek Macedonians and the “native” Macedonians.

The communists didn’t do that because they “liked” the Macedonians, they only did it because they “hated” the repressive elements in Greece and because they wanted the Macedonian people on their side. Let me be clear on that.

But even though the persecuted Macedonians got the upper hand on their neo-Greek abusers, they never acted against them or attempted to pay them back for the abuses they received. They just left them alone.

Then, after WW II ended, the Great Powers, the USA, Britain and Russia, decided to place Greece under British influence which again brought back the repressive Greek regime. This, naturally, infuriated the Macedonians and pushed them en masse into the hands of the communists.

The Macedonians did not like the communists for their ideological standpoint but decided to join them because the communists allegedly offered them a better alternative. This, by the way, never materialized.

To attract them to the communist side, the communists offered the Macedonians what the Macedonians wanted: to form a united and independent Macedonian state. Basically they lied to the Macedonian people to get them committed to the war effort to drive

the occupiers out of Greece. The Macedonians took the bait and began to join the communist sponsored organizations en masse.

Then, somewhere down the line, the British found out that Macedonians existed in Greek occupied Macedonia. The Greeks had been telling the world that “Macedonians don’t exist” while British agents on the ground, during World War II, were reporting that Macedonians not only existed but were in large numbers in Lerin, Kostur and Voden Regions and that practically half of the anti-fascist fighting force in Greece was Macedonian. In other words, almost half of the ELAS (National Liberation Army of Greece) fighters in Greece were Macedonians.

The existence of Macedonians in Greece, coupled with the fact that they were armed and were being offered independence by the communists, caused quite a stir in Britain and, behind closed doors, the British decided that these Macedonians had to go. But go where? This was their home.

According to declassified documents they had to go outside of the current Greek borders, somewhere north. And soon after this decision was made a home was found for them in Yugoslavia. The Fascist government of Yugoslavia had offered to take them. But before this plan could be implemented, Tito’s communists took power in Yugoslavia and the plan was put on the back burner.

Britain was worried that Russia might intervene on behalf of these Macedonians and put Greece in jeopardy by calling for their recognition and offering them the option of choosing their own destiny in accordance with the Atlantic Charter. So the best choice for Britain was to “get rid of them” from Greece. But how, and send them where without raising suspicions? After all it was illegal to just uproot people from their homeland because they just didn’t fit with Britain’s political agenda and interests.

Just as World War II was winding down, Britain was faced with a couple of problems. It had to destroy the communists in Greece and get rid of the Macedonians.

I should mention here that even though ELAS was a communist force it was placed under British control and not under Russian control. So it was no problem for Britain to disarm ELAS and take control of Greece. And that is exactly what it did. Britain ordered ELAS to disarm and surrender its weapons and Britain installed a regime of its choosing as a Greek government.

To get rid of the Macedonians unfortunately was a more complicated matter because one, the war (WW II) was over and two, it needed outside support; someone to take them. It is easy to push people around during a war but impossible to do it during peace time. This is why the “Greek Civil War” was invented. Wars generate refugees and refugees flee over borders to save themselves.

I am not going to talk about the Greek Civil War here in detail because we covered it in our last interview but I do want to say that this War was invented and served as cover to get rid of the Macedonians from Greece. It was a controlled war, controlled by Zahariadis who was sent to Greece by the British to crush the communists and get rid of the Macedonians.

Since we are talking about divisions in the Macedonian people, I would like to say that outside of the polarization of the neo-Greek and Macedonian division, there were also other divisions forming. During the war the neo-Greeks supported the Greek government which stood on the political right. The Macedonians stood on the side of the Communist Party of Greece which stood on the political left. The left and right at the time were at war with each other. Then additional new divisions began to surface in the left block as a result of the various promises made and actions taken by the CPG.

The Macedonian people on the left side knew that they had been betrayed when the CPG agreed with Britain to install what the Macedonian people considered a “fascist” political party in Greece. They knew that the fascist Greeks would be back in power and would resume the torment. So when Britain ordered ELAS to disarm, some Macedonians units refused. This brought them onto a collision course with ELAS and a war between them was imminent. So to avoid this collision these units fled over the border into the Republic of Macedonia and came under Yugoslav control.

The expectation of the Macedonian people supporting the left side of the political spectrum was that the Macedonian units that left for Yugoslavia were specifically created to protect the Macedonian people from Greek aggression and from the neo-Greeks. But because these Macedonian fighters left for Yugoslavia, they were seen as traitors by some, leaving even their own families behind to be abused by the Greeks.

Then, as the Greek Civil War escalated, some of these fighters who left for Yugoslavia later returned but many stayed behind. And so the division between those who returned to fight in the Greek Civil War and those who remained in Yugoslavia began to widen. Those who left Yugoslavia accused those who remained behind of being “cowards”, of wanting to save their own skins at the cost of their own people, even at the cost of their own families. And those who remained behind in Yugoslavia were accusing those who left for Greece, of “treachery” and of “helping” the Greeks to protect Greece. The CPG also manipulated the situation and widened the division by accusing those who remained in Yugoslavia of being “deserters”.

The Macedonian division began to widen even more, and turned into an unbridgeable chasm, when Tito began to fight with Stalin and the Macedonian people were caught in the middle of their dispute. So, now we had a four-way Macedonian division.

1. Macedonians on the political left fighting against the Macedonian neo-Greeks on the political right.

2. Partisan Macedonians fighting against Macedonian soldiers in the Greek army.

3. Macedonians fighting in the Greek Civil War against Macedonians in Yugoslavia opposing the Greek Civil War.

4. Titoist Macedonians fighting against Stalinist Macedonians.

All of these divisions were deeply rooted and still exist in the Macedonian people to this day.

Unfortunately all of these divisions were due to external factors that tore apart the Macedonian fabric and pulled the Macedonian people in many directions. Some Macedonians accepted the idea that if you can’t beat them, join them and decided to “assimilate” into the Greek fold. Others liked what the Greek communists were offering and decided to join them. Unfortunately what the Greek communists were offering became very confusing and changed over time. That is because the Greek communists were dishonest about what they were trying to do. They had hidden motives of wanting to get the Macedonian people involved in a “perpetrated” war so that they could “remove” them from Greece. So when the Greek communists wanted the Macedonians involved in the war they offered more of what the Macedonians wanted. When too many Macedonians became involved in the war the Greek communists scaled down on their offers. This was done so that they could control how many people joined the struggle, making sure it did not run away on them.

The purpose of the war, however, was a constant; to get rid of the Macedonian people from Greece by legal means. This is how Britain wanted it. So a plan was concocted to start a new war in Greece and to involve the Macedonian people en masse. The moment the Macedonian people picked up arms, Greece would then have no choice but to fight back and drive them out. Yugoslavia was also involved in this because it created NOF (National Liberation Front). NOF’s purpose was to start a “revolution” in Greek occupied Macedonia. But when it arrived and began to agitate the people it found that the people did not want to fight. The Macedonian people did not want to fight another war, for them the war (WW II) was over and they were ready to enjoy peace.

Unable to motivate them to fight for a free Macedonia to be united with Yugoslavia, something new and something more drastic had to be done. “White terror” was introduced. The political right unleashed its fascist forces on the Macedonian population killing people, burning homes, raping women, beating and jailing people, and so on. This naturally frightened the Macedonian population and left it with two options “fight back” or “die”. So, people began to flee to the mountains where they were organized and armed by NOF.

NOF was there to organize and assist them. This, however, was not a NOF initiative; the NOF leadership simply followed orders blindly and basically did what it was told.

Initially the Communist Party of Yugoslavia was in control of events on the ground but then when Zahariadis was dispatched to Greece by Britain to take control of the Communist Party of Greece he took over control of NOF. After Zahariadis consolidated his power over the communists he took control of NOF and, through NOF, took control of the Macedonian people.

Please allow me at this point to summarize some of the points we discussed in the previous interview, about why at this time a war in Greece was not practical and why the promises made to the Macedonian people by the CPY and by the CPG were not achievable.

The purpose of the Greek Civil War, as we are being told by mainstream history, was to install a communist system in Greece. This, however, was not possible because Stalin of Russia who supported the political left in Greece and Churchill of Britain who supported the political right in Greece had already decided to place Greece under British influence and both leaders had agreed that “there will be no communist system in Greece”.

So, how then was Zahariadis going to create a communist system in Greece, as he promised, when he had no support from Greece’s patrons, the Great Powers? He wasn’t! His sole aim was not to create but to destroy the communists in Greece and to get rid of the Macedonians once and for all.

In order to motivate the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia to fight harder and in greater numbers, both the CPY and the CPG offered them independence and the choice of uniting Greek occupied Macedonia with the Republic of Macedonia under a Yugoslav federation. But this offer had a catch. This offer was only valid if the communists took power in Greece which, as I mentioned earlier, was not possible.

The truth is that an International border, the iron curtain, was running between Greek occupied Macedonia and the Republic of Macedonia, which was an impossible “barrier” to breach without Great Power cooperation. And the Great Powers at the time were not cooperating and have not cooperated since then to this day.

At the same time this was going on in Greece, the Greek people were told that the “Slavs” from the north and the “Slav speaking” Greeks were causing all these problems in their country. The Slavs assisted by the communists were attempting to break up Greece and give their Greek-Macedonia to Yugoslavia. While all this was going on, the rest of the world was led to believe that this was a “Greek Civil War” where the communists were attempting to “impose themselves” on Greece.

This was a great cover to not only cover up the fact that a genocide was being committed against the Macedonian people but to also make the Macedonian people think that they were fighting for their rights and that it was their fault for not only losing the war but for starting it in the first place. This also made the Greek people feel good thinking that they had fought against outside forces and won in their attempt to protect their country. As for the rest of the world, this War was all about politics and ideologies.

The conflict inside Greece was not recognized as a “Greek Civil War” until the 1970’s. Until then it was thought of as a “bandit” war. This is because the Greek people, during the war, were told that the war was being fought between the “treacherous Slav bandits” and the “patriotic Greeks”. How can it be a “Greek Civil War”? A generation or two had to pass before they could again pull the wool over their own people’s eyes.

When massive numbers of Macedonian refugees began to arrive in Poland, the Polish people thought they were Greeks fighting to install communism in Greece. Most ordinary people in the Eastern European countries, where many Macedonians ended up, had no idea that these people were Macedonians; they didn’t even know that Macedonians existed until they met them. They were told the refugees were Greeks.

The moment the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia picked up arms and fought back to defend themselves, the plan to exterminate them was put in motion and the Macedonian genocide became legal. What was Greece to do? It had to fight back to defend itself, insisting that the war was imported from the north. It even had a United Nations Commission investigate it to prove that it was provoked and supported by outsiders, mainly by Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and Albania.

I mentioned earlier that the so-called “Greek Civil War” was a controlled war. At this point I would like to say a few words about that.

The many Macedonians with whom I have discussed this war have insisted that if we Macedonians had our own leaders and if we Macedonians were allowed to fight the way we wanted, we would have won the war. But what most Macedonians on the ground don’t understand is that the “architects” of this war did not want the Macedonians to “win”; they wanted them to “lose” that is why it had to be a controlled war.

If the Greek communists wanted the Macedonian people to gain their independence, like they were promising, they would have allowed them to conduct their own business; they would have allowed them to appoint their own leaders, choose the type and number of fighting units they wanted, choose their own battles, and so on. The Greek communists did not do any of those things because they wanted to control the Macedonian movement. But in order to control it the Greek communists had to impose themselves on the Macedonian people and restrict and control their activities. They especially had to control the Macedonian leaders in NOF and steer NOF in the direction they wanted it to go. Then when the CPY surrendered NOF to the CPG, Zahariadis took control of everything. After that he basically manipulated every outcome of the struggle. This was no coincidence; it was purposely planned this way from higher up. Even General Markos was dismissed because he refused to enter a “frontal” war with his opponent. Markos knew that if the partisans, who were successful in hit and run operations, were placed in a stationary position they would be demolished. But those above Zahariadis did not want this war to linger on and wanted the

partisans crushed as soon as possible and what better way to crush them than to put them up against a much superior enemy in a frontal war. Zahariadis dismissed Markos and took command of the partisans himself and ordered them to form front lines and fight in a front.

“…When Markos refused to step down, Zahariadis accused him of being a spy and sent him to Russia to be treated for a mental disorder. When the wheel of history turned, General Markos sent a letter to the KPSS Central Committee in which he accused Zahariadis of being a spy and an international traitor. According to Markos, the main reason for sending the letter was not to indict Zahariadis but to clear the air about himself. Markos wanted to dissociate himself from Zahariadis and from speculation and gossip that he too was an agent of British intelligence just like Zahariadis…” (Stoian Kochov).

Then when the Democratic Army of Greece (DAG) was destroyed by the Greek government forces, Zahariadis, to throw attention away from himself, accused the leaders of NOF of being responsible for the defeat because, according to Zahariadis, “they were working for Tito”, they were Tito’s agents. This was yet another cover up to throw attention “somewhere else”, away from himself, from being discovered that he not only destroyed the communists in Greece and exiled the Macedonians, but that he was a British agent.

A long time ago Stalin had ordered both Tito and Zahariadis to end the armed struggle in Greece, not only because it was futile but because it reflected badly on Stalin and on the agreement he had made with Churchill. On top of that Stalin was not sure how the United States was going to react if this armed conflict escalated or was prolonged. Stalin himself was worried that the United States might retaliate against the Soviet Union if, for some reason, it thought the Soviet Union was assisting the war effort in Greece. Stalin wanted no part of that. This is why he specifically ordered Tito to stop supplying the war effort and Zahariadis to scale the war down and end it.

But Tito decided to defy Stalin, perhaps, I am assuming, because he had made a secret deal with the British to assist in the “destruction”

of the Macedonians? In any case Tito’s disobedience angered Stalin which resulted in Yugoslavia being thrown out of the Cominform in June, 1948. Tito was found guilty of disobedience and all Eastern European communist governments, under the influence of the Soviet Union, were ordered to break relations with the CPY.

After that Tito and Stalin became arch-enemies and Zahariadis always found it convenient to blame “everything” on Tito, including the continuation of the war, the defeat of the partisan army and the destruction of the communists in Greece. In other words, to hide his own actions and from being discovered that he himself was a British agent, Zahariadis basically told Stalin that it was Tito and NOF that continued the war and that he had nothing to do with it. This naturally further divided the Macedonian people because Zahariadis told them that the “culprits” of losing the war were the leaders of NOF who followed Tito’s agenda, which had aims to sabotage their struggle. Many believed Zahariadis.

Unfortunately Stalin was in agreement with Zahariadis and exiled the Macedonian NOF leadership to serve a life sentence of hard labour in the Siberian prison camps. After Stalin died, having found no proof of wrong doing, the NOF leaders were freed and returned to Yugoslavia where most were welcome as “heroes” despite the fact that they were pawns in a game to destroy their own people.

Upon their return to the Republic of Macedonia, almost the entire NOF leadership was welcomed back with open arms, given homes and jobs in government positions and made responsible for welcoming the returning Macedonian refugees, including the fighters, who were scattered all throughout Eastern Europe and the USSR.

Now one can only imagine how the former fighters must have felt after they came back to find their former “traitor” leaders in charge of their destiny… again… Remember Zahariadis told the fighters that the reason they lost the war and were driven out of their homes and homeland was because these very same NOF leaders betrayed them.

I personally was witness to an argument between two Macedonians about this, only about a decade ago, when I heard a Zahariadis supporter yelling “Zahariadis was right”. These Macedonians, who fought under his command, believed Zahariadis was a “hero” and the NOF leaders were “traitors”. I guess no one, especially those who “adored” Zahariadis, was prepared to accept the fact that they were used by Zahariadis to commit a heinous crime against their own people. No one wants to believe that they were made fools of and that they sacrificed themselves to destroy something they believed they were fighting to protect and preserve. Even most of the NOF leadership believed and trusted Zahariadis… until they were betrayed by him in the end.

To make matters worse, the returning refugees including the former fighters were not welcomed as heroes when they returned to the Republic of Macedonia. The moment they arrived they were sent to Idrizovo Prison in Skopje for debriefing and treated like criminals by the interrogators. One woman with three little children was locked up in jail for two whole days until her turn came to be debriefed. She demanded to know what she had done to deserve this treatment. She received no answer…

And what did they ask during the debriefing? The most important question was “political allegiance”. “Are you with Tito or with Stalin!?” God help those who said “with Stalin” because they are probably still rotting in camps to this day. I asked about that and was told that only very few remained in the camps… those who were suffering from “mental illnesses”…

To make matters even worse, the Macedonians who had deserted the war and were labeled “traitors” and “deserters” by the Communist Party of Greece and by the DAG fighters were put in charge of providing “character references” for the returning fighters. This felt like grinding salt in their still open wounds.

Every effort was made to make life very difficult for the Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia, which in the end not only made them bitter but also made them feel like they were guilty of everything that went wrong in the war. It was their fault for not winning the war. It was their fault for being stupid to follow the

Greeks. It was their fault for being driven out of their homes and for abandoning their homeland. There was no end to their misery… and no one wanted to hear about it… And so they suffered in silence until Yugoslavia disintegrated and the Republic of Macedonia divorced itself from that nightmare in 1991.

People who ask me “why are we so divided?” have no clue what we have been through and what we are going through to this day.

INTERVIEWER – Earlier you said the returning Macedonians were questioned about their “political allegiance”. “Are you with Tito or with Stalin!?” What was that all about?

RISTO – Well, as I said earlier, at the time Tito and Stalin were involved in a verbal war and Stalin did many things to have Tito brought down, including assassination attempts. Among the many threats made, Stalin also threatened to “break up” Yugoslavia by creating an independent Republic of Macedonia. Stalin threatened to organize a Macedonian army and send it back to break away Tito’s part of Macedonia. That was the reason why Tito closed the Yugoslav border and refused to allow DAG fighters to enter Yugoslav territory armed. That was also the reason why Stalin took the Macedonian fighters to the USSR, to Tashkent. Stalin’s actions, however, pushed Tito even further towards the “Western camp” and if Stalin touched Tito he knew he would have WW III on his hands.

So, fearing that the returning Macedonian fighters might still be a threat, Tito had his people screen them as they entered the Republic of Macedonia and who was better equipped to screen them than those who knew them from the war, the deserters who Tito trusted.

This war is a mystery in itself which will take many years to unravel because nothing about it is what it seems. The 60 years of silence unfortunately did not help.

Let me say that the fact alone that Greece closed the border on the Macedonian civilian refugees, on the innocent people fleeing to save themselves from being killed, and prevented them from returning back to their homes, speaks volumes. This act by itself verifies that the Greeks had aims at permanently “exiling” the Macedonian

people. One does not need to know the whole story to figure out what went on in Greek occupied Macedonia during that war.

Also, the communists who started the Greek Civil War had no exit strategy in case the war went sideways… There was no negotiated settlement for ending the war… There was no negotiated settlement for returning the refugees including the 28,000 children who were evacuated in 1948… There were no safeguards put in place to protect the innocent… Every single Macedonian was told by Zahariadis and his cronies that “we are winning the war it’s only a matter of time before we defeat the enemy…” Even after what remained of DAG withdrew to Albania, Zahariadis still insisted that the war was not over and that they were re-grouping to go back and fight… There was no end to the lies and deceit…

INTERVIEWER – You said a person does not need to know the “whole story” to figure out what happened during the Greek Civil War? How do you figure that?

RISTO – It’s easy in hindsight. By process of elimination and by examining what was said and what was done.

For example every time Zahariadis needed more Macedonians to sacrifice he said “by joining this struggle en masse you Macedonians have earned the right to self-determination and to create your own country”. First of all who was this Zahariadis to make such promises, God? This was not possible without the consent of Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Greece and Albania and without Great Power approval. So obviously Zahariadis was “lying” to the Macedonian people.

Zahariadis later said “by joining this struggle en masse you Macedonians have earned the right to be equal to the Greeks” but he could only guarantee these rights if the communists in Greece won the war. Did Zahariadis not know that one, Greece was under British influence and that the British would not allow the communists to win in Greece? Two, how were the Macedonians expected to win the war when the Greek communists controlled everything associated with that war? So obviously Zahariadis “lied” about that too.

So, how many lies must be told to discover that something isn’t right?

Look at what the Macedonian people were offered and look at what they received. They were offered a country of their own and human rights and they received “genocide”. Was this a coincidence? No! It was perpetrated! Everything that was said and done after the fact was to bury the evidence and let the guilty get away with murder.

Our “genocide” has never been reported or investigated. One should be able to see how this can make some people… even some countries, nervous. The surface of the so-called “Greek Civil War” is now being scratched and it stinks of “genocide” to high heaven. What more can I tell you?

INTERVIEWER – You said that Yugoslavia was involved in this too?

RISTO – Yes, I believe it was but only a few people in Yugoslavia knew about it. Think about it. Tito knew about all the things I mentioned earlier. The iron curtain, the sphere of influence Agreement between Stalin and Churchill, how the British felt about the communists in Greece… about the Macedonian presence in Greek occupied Macedonia… all of it. And as I mentioned earlier Tito even had a tiff with Stalin about supplying the war effort in Greece.

Also please note that NOF was formed on April 23, 1945 under Tito and Kolishevski’s leadership and was dispatched to Greece by Kolishevski in the fall of the same year. The elections in Greece which initiated the Greek Civil War were scheduled to take place on March 31st, 1946. Why would Tito and Kolishevski prepare and dispatch NOF to Greek occupied Macedonia to start a new conflict even before the elections were decided unless Tito knew something beforehand?

Then, look at how Tito’s cronies treated the Macedonian fighters when they were returning to their homeland. He treated them like “criminals”! Why? So that they wouldn’t ask too many questions?

I don’t believe the NOF leadership was involved in the conspiracy. I believe they were patriots in their hearts who allowed their hearts, instead of their minds, to guide them. They lacked the courage to ask “why” and just did what they were told.

So Yugoslavia was involved alright! Some of the top leaders were part of the conspiracy, the rest were too busy being loyal sycophants to notice anything. Survival in those days depended on who you knew and not on what you knew. Not many cared about what you knew. That’s how it was for us Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia living under Yugoslav rule.

INTERVIEWER – Do similar divisions, the kind that existed in the Republic of Macedonia after the war, exist in the Diaspora?

RISTO – No. I have not observed such divisions here. But I will tell you a story of how I discovered them.