Introduction - Part 10

The idea of evacuating the children was proposed by a sympathetic group of young men and women at a Youth Conference in 1947 in Belgrade, Yugoslavia. The escalating conflict in the Greek Civil War posed a threat to the civilian population, which was a concern for the "progressive youth". Although they couldn't do anything for the civilian adults who were needed to support the war effort, there was a way to help the children. They proposed a temporary evacuation whereby the children would be sent out of the country to pursue their education in safety, with the intent of being returned once the conflict ended. Although it was a good idea, the Greek Communist Party (KKE) saw no immediate need for such a plan and as a result it didn't give it much support. Partisan General Markos Vafiadis saw merit in the proposal because he believed that the conflict would escalate and concentrate in western Aegean (Greek occupied) Macedonia. He was, at the time, responsible for the defense of parts of western Macedonia that included the territories of the Lerin region and parts of Kostur and Voden regions. In 1947 the Partisans were at their peak strength and, with the exception of the large cities, were in control of all territories in western Aegean Macedonia. When the Greek Government began to use heavy artillery and aerial bombardment, the idea quickly gained KKE support and the "save the children" program was born. Before the program was put into action it gained approval from the Macedonian Liberation Front, the Women's Antifascist Front and the Red Cross. The host countries, willing to look after the children, were contacted to gain their approval and information campaigns were begun to inform the people about the program. The district and village organizations were also asked to participate and were eventually given the responsibility of organizing and implementing the actual evacuations. When the authorities in the Greek Government found out about the “save the children” program they initiated their own so-called "pedomazoma" (collect the children) campaign. The Greek army upon capturing Macedonian villages was ordered to evacuate the children, by force if necessary. After being gathered at various camps the children were eventually sent to the Greek Island of Leros. There they were enrolled in schools to study religion and became wards of the Greek Queen, Fredericka.

After the conclusion of the Greek Civil War (1951-52) some children from the “pedomazoma” were returned to their homes in Macedonia. Most, especially those whose parents were killed or fled the country as refugees, became wards of the Greek State and remained in dormitories until adulthood. All the children who remained at Leros were completely Hellenized and were never heard from again. The Leros camps became active again after 1952, this time with children who had returned from the “save the children” program from Eastern Block countries. As a result of Red Cross intervention some children were allowed to return home. Unfortunately the Greek authorities collected them and sent them to the camps in Leros where they were kept until the fall of 1959 before they were released. Pressure from the community prompted organizers of the "save the children" program to expedite the evacuation process to stop the "Burandari" (nickname for Greek Government soldiers and policemen) from taking more children. The evacuations carried out by the Partisans were done strictly on a voluntary basis. It was up to the child's parents or guardians to decide whether the child was to be evacuated or not. No child was ever evacuated by force or without consent, but fear and peer pressure were certainly motivating factors. The evacuation zones were selected based on the severity of the conflict and the degree of danger it posed to the children. Central command organizers decided on the selection criteria and qualifications for which children were to be evacuated. The lists included all children between the ages of two and fourteen as well as all orphans, disabled and special children. Before the evacuation was put into effect, women over the age of eighteen were enlisted from the local population and from the Partisan ranks to be trained to handle young children. Widows of fallen Partisans were also recruited as "surrogate mothers" to accompany and assist the children through the evacuation process and during their stay in the host countries. The evacuation program began to gain momentum in early March 1948 starting with the recruitment and training of the special teachers. The actual evacuations were carried out en masse starting on March 25th through to March 30th, 1948 until all the designated villages were evacuated. Most children were transported through Yugoslavia and were sent to Hungary, Romania, Czechoslovakia and Poland. Some were evacuated through Albania and Bulgaria. As the numbers of the evacuated rose, children were also sent to East Germany and the USSR. It is

estimated that about 28,000 children in all were evacuated, most of them from northwestern Aegean Macedonia. Although smaller in number some orphans, children of Partisans and children of families who were in trouble with the Greek Government authorities were also evacuated. When the violence in Greece subsided, parents and relatives began to inquire about repatriating their children. Those who displayed some loyalty to the Greek cause were told that their children would be allowed to return if decreed by the Greek Queen Fredericka. Unfortunately this process required connections with the local Greek authorities and a lot of money, money that most Macedonians did not have. Those considered for repatriation had to meet a number of conditions including the willingness to accept permanent Hellenization. Children from Partisan families were automatically disqualified. Those who weren't willing to change their names or weren't liked for some reason were also disqualified. As the years passed fewer children were allowed to return and requests for repatriation continued to be ignored. Parents and relatives died and still their children were not allowed to return, not even for a visit. Macedonian generations born in Greek occupied Macedonia after the early 1950’s were brought up under an atmosphere of fear, suspicion and mistrust and began to lose contact with other Macedonians even in their own neighbourhoods. Many of these Macedonians who visited Canada, Australia and the USA, found culturally thriving Macedonian Communities. The freedom of belonging to a nation without punishment allowed the Macedonians in the Diaspora to form village community organizations, regional and even national organizations like the United Macedonians who not only aspired to have a mother country like the Republic of Macedonia but wished to see a united geographical Macedonia encompassing every ethnic Macedonian from everywhere. Macedonians, especially from Greece, visiting relatives in the Diaspora found themselves overwhelmed with feelings of what it is to be Macedonian. More recently regional organizations like “The Lerin Region Macedonian Cultural Association of Ontario” were formed to culturally bridge Macedonians living in Ontario with their compatriots living in the Lerin Region. Visitors to Canada returning to Greece brought news with them that Macedonians were alive and well in the Diaspora. Macedonians not only existed but thrived as Macedonians with their own culture, language, traditions and Church and most importantly, they were free to do so with no state obstacles.

Macedonian churches in the Diaspora were first built in the early 1960’s and since then have served as bastions of Macedonian unity and culture. Although still restricted from speaking their language and practicing their culture, ethnic Macedonians in Greece and Bulgaria began to assert their rights as people first by speaking Macedonian in public and then by singing Macedonian songs at weddings and festivals. At first they could only sing and play melodies without lyrics but in time and as the numbers grew they began to add lyrics and even record songs in Macedonian. With the imminent breakup of Yugoslavia looming over the horizon, Macedonians worldwide began to see the possibility of at last having their own State. Even the oppressed Macedonians in Greece began to feel the fervor and started to form their own movements. According to Pavle Voskopoulos, a Macedonian activist in Greece, “Vinozhito and the Macedonian activists in Greece have come a long way in the last twenty years or so since their first appearance in 1982. It was in 1982 that, for the first time since the 1940s, Macedonian songs and dances began to be openly and publicly expressed. No one would have believed that ten years later the Macedonians would have been able to organize Vinozhito. Even after Vinozhito became a political party in Greece, no one would have believed that in the next ten years it would hold its first successful congress in Solun, the heartland of Greek chauvinism. This was only possible through the hard work and perseverance of Vinozhito’s membership and with the assistance of Vinozhito’s European partners.” In their fight for human rights as national minorities in Greece, Bulgaria and Albania organizations such as Vinozhito, OMO Ilinden, OMO Ilinden-Pirin, Bratstvo, MIR, Prespa, MED and others began to form. To help their compatriots in the occupied Macedonian territories, human rights and other organizations began to form in the Diaspora. These organizations became the voice of the Macedonian people in the occupied territories. Initially the most active were the Detsa Begaltsi (Refugee children from the Greek Civil War) who organized worldwide and brought world attention to their plight, unfortunately without much success. Greece refused to hear their pleas and would not budge on their issues.

The Republic of Macedonia

As federal Yugoslavia began to disintegrate in the late 1980’s the Macedonians in the Peoples’ Republic of Macedonia sought their chance to finally create their own state. On September 8, 1991, in a referendum, 95% of eligible voters approved of a sovereign and independent Republic of Macedonia with Kiro Gligorov as its President. The will of the people was confirmed on September 18, 1991 at the Macedonian Parliament with the declaration for acceptance of the results from the referendum. The next important step in strengthening the state was the adoption of the Constitution on November 17, 1991, which was supplemented after the 2001 conflict and signing of the Ohrid Framework Agreement. The internationally legal subjectivity of the state was recognized on April 8, 1993 with an acclamation of the UN General Assembly. Macedonia was admitted as the 181st full-fledged member. Fearing that it might lose its Macedonian occupied territories, Greece was first to object to the Republic of Macedonia’s independence. Although the European Community acknowledged that Macedonia had fulfilled the requirements for official recognition, due to the opposition of Greece which was already a member of the community, the EC decided to postpone the recognition. Greece, afraid that Macedonia might put forward a historical, cultural and linguistic claim over Aegean Macedonia, insisted that the new nation had no right to use of the name "Macedonia" and use the emblem of ancient Macedonia on its flag. In July 1992 there were massive demonstrations by Macedonians in the capital Skopje over the failure to receive recognition. But despite Greek objections, Macedonia in 1993 was admitted to the United Nations under the temporary reference (not an official name) "the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia". Full diplomatic relations with a number of EC nations followed, while Russia, China, Turkey, Bulgaria and most nations ignored Greece's objections and recognized Macedonia under its constitutional name "Republic of Macedonia". Greece, dissatisfied with the results, in February 1994 imposed a trade embargo on Macedonia in an attempt to force President Gligorov to make changes to his country’s name, nation and language and amend the Constitution to remove Article 47 which stipulated that "the Republic of Macedonia cares for the statue and rights of those persons belonging to the Macedonian people in neighboring countries, as well as Macedonian ex-

parties, assists their cultural development and promotes links with them." Ironically, Greece also has a similar article in its own Constitution, as is normal for any country in the world to care for its minorities in other countries. Faced with an economic collapse and left without any support from the international community, Macedonia had no choice but to change its flag and constitution, after which Greece lifted the embargo. In 1995 Human Rights Watch - Helsinki condemned Greece for the oppression of its ethnic Macedonian minority, which Greece denies exists. Both Amnesty International and the European Parliament urged Greece to recognize the Macedonian language and to stop oppressing ethnic Macedonians living within its borders. Still reeling from the Greek embargo, from the internationally imposed embargo on Serbia, its traditional trading partner, and from unresolved issues with Greece, the Republic of Macedonia was faced with a new set of problems, a war at home. Due to the conflict north of Macedonia and as a result of the NATO bombing of Serbia, an influx of war refugees numbering in the three hundred thousand entered Macedonia. This created economic as well as political strain on impoverished Macedonia which on one hand, had to cope with a 15% overnight population increase and on another with criticisms from various human rights groups for the ways it handled the refugees. No sooner than that crisis was over, armed bands of Albanian fighters, spilled over from the Serbian conflict began to infiltrate and stir up trouble in Macedonia. In 2001 these illegal bands, first branded by the international community as terrorists and later as “freedom fighters” began to occupy camps and later villages in western Macedonia. Initially, these bands were seen as benign but as they started to assert themselves by restricting travel, kidnappings, torturing civilians and cutting off electricity and water supplies to various communities, the Macedonian police and military began to pursue them. There was an immediate backlash from the western media which, in spite of their violent acts, the Albanian band were viewed as human right fighters and the Macedonian government and its people as aggressors. As the war raged on in western Macedonia, rumors were flying, some substantiated, that certain elements in the Macedonian government were involved in sparking the conflict in order to partition the Republic of Macedonia perhaps between Albania and Serbia, Greece or Bulgaria.

“In 1992 I came across a high-ranking NATO source in Brussels, Belgium. He revealed to me the secret plan to partition Macedonia along ethnic lines after a short war: the west would be incorporated into a Greater Albania and the left over parts would be incorporated either by Serbia or Bulgaria. I found the plan to be far-fetched when I first heard it. I thought this person was pulling my leg. But later events showed that it wasn't far-fetched. The NATO source invited me out for drinks a number of times. He was a big vodka drinker. He must have had 5 or six when he let rip with the revelation that Macedonia's days as an independent nation were numbered. I laughed and said, ‘I agree with you unless the problem of corruption and the economy are fixed.’ ‘No it's not just a matter of money,’ he said. ‘There are greater outside forces at work that you don't know about.’ He would not elaborate. He had another 5 vodkas and left. This cat and mouse game kept going for a month or two, until he let it all hang out. He revealed in great detail how war would start in Macedonia; he named names; told me how weapons were being smuggled by ethnic Albanian insurgents into Macedonia through Kosovo and from Albania. He said a favourite supply route was through the western town of Debar, which sits on the Macedonian-Albanian border. He mentioned there were a number of mountain caves near Debar being used to hide weapons. Donkeys were being used to ferry ammunition. But he would not tell me who was pushing for war in Macedonia. By 1993 UN peacekeepers from the UNPROFOR mission were deployed to protect Macedonia's borders. This mission later became UNPREDEP. Years later, for some crazy reason the Macedonian government recognized Taiwan and China in retaliation used its seat in the UN Security Council to stop the mission. With UN peacekeepers out of the way, the 2001 war in Macedonia began as a spill over from the Kosovo conflict of 1999. The whole thing was mind-boggling. I remember talking to Mira, an elderly Serbian woman who was teaching the Macedonian language to Belgian children. She asked me what I was interested in writing about Macedonia. I said to her I would like to investigate the claims made by the NATO source and look into past Yugoslav communist crimes in Macedonia such as the infamous Chento show trial of 1946. Her response was "You don't need to dig up the past nor worry about the future." I found her lack of curiosity surprising considering her ex-husband was famous Macedonian writer Meto Jovanovski, and both her

children are journalists. Son Borjan Jovanovski was a former Presidential media spokesman whilst daughter Svetlana Jovanovska is the Brussels correspondent for major newspaper Dnevnik. One day walked into our Brussels office a fit looking man in his late 30s or early 40s. He had very short blonde hair and had a military bearing. He introduced himself as Andreas Renatus Hartmann, a Member of the European Parliament for the German political party, The Christian Democratic Union (CDU). Mr. Hartmann invited Dr Naumovski and myself to dinner at a swanky Moroccan restaurant. The dinner went well. We talked about a wide variety of subjects but the attention inevitably turned to the Balkans. I was enjoying eating the couscous and almost choked when Mr. Hartmann said matter of fact that German Intelligence was about to open its first ‘station’ in Tirana, Albania since World War II, and the British were pissed off at being beaten to the punch. I though to myself why is this guy telling me this? He dropped more bombshells when he said that Europe, in particular German and France did not want an Islamic state in the Balkans namely Bosnia-Hercegovina or a Greater Albania. The German and French right wing parties wanted to strengthen Macedonia to act as a buffer state against possible Islamic fundamentalist terrorism. I found this at odds with the NATO source's revelations. Was Macedonia caught in the cross-fire of a power play between competing European nations? What could it possibly all mean? And why was I told this? I could only speculate and say maybe they saw me as a young and enthusiastic journalist wanting to make a name for myself who would float the information in my articles. But what they didn't count on was unbelieving newspaper editors!” (Sasha Uzunov) A month later it was confirmed, when a force of 400 KLA (Kosovo Liberation Army) fighters was surrounded in the Village Arachinovo near the capital, Skopje. As Macedonian security forces moved in, they were halted on NATO orders. U.S. army buses from Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo arrived to remove all the heavily armed terrorists to a safer area of Macedonia. Macedonia was forced to concede defeat and obliged to accept all the terrorist demands. When the peace treaty was signed, Lord Robertson proclaimed, "This day marks the entry of Macedonia into modern, mainstream Europe ... a very proud day for their country." (James Bisset).

This war placed great strains on Macedonia’s economy and created a long lasting divide between the Macedonian and Albanian communities in Macedonia, communities that coexisted peacefully for centuries. The western media vilified Macedonia quickly forgetting that Macedonia was the only republic to peacefully break away from Yugoslavia. “The West has always insisted on the just principle that violence, terror, and ethnic cleansing should not pay. This principle was enforced -sometimes militarily - in Bosnia and Croatia. Yet, for tactical and political reasons, the West has made two exceptions: Kosovo, and Macedonia. In Kosovo, it rewarded a crime organization turned liberation movement (the KLA or UCK). It armed it, trained it, and transformed it into a respectable political player and partner in shaping the future and nature of Kosovo. In Macedonia, it has leaned on the democratically elected government of a sovereign country to accommodate the demands of armed terrorists, even as these terrorists continued to intimidate, murder, occupy land, and ethnically cleanse its Macedonian inhabitants. Thus, Macedonia is made to pay for the mistakes of the West in creating a monster (the KLA) that is now well out of their control (in the form of the NLA and ANA) and threatens to transform KFOR into 50,000 hostages in Kosovo.” (Sam Vaknin) The war lasted approximately six months and officially ended with the signing of the Ohrid agreement on August 13, 2001. “According to the Ohrid Peace Agreement, the international community was invited to support the challenging road of Macedonia from the brink of civil war in August 2001 to peace, stability and integration into Euro-Atlantic structures. In response to a request for NATO assistance made by the Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski on June 20, 2001, this military organization drawn up the operational plan that was dedicated to the peace and stability of the Republic of Macedonia. However, NATO had imposed three conditions for its help in resolving the crisis: conclusion of political agreement between the various parties in the Republic of Macedonia, armistice linked with amnesty for the members of the so-called NLA and finally pledge of full demilitarization from the so-called NLA. Once the Macedonian political parties signed the Ohrid Peace Agreement, the way was opened for NATO’s first mission in the Republic of Macedonia. The NATO military support to the Republic of Macedonia effectively commenced on August 27, 2001, with Operation Essential Harvest / Task

Force Harvest (TFH). This UK-leaded mission involved the rapid deployment of 4,600 Allied troops that were initiated to fulfill NATO’s promise to assist the Macedonian people by collecting and destroying arms and ammunition on a voluntary basis from ethnic-Albanian extremists. By September 14, 2001, the successful disarmament of the armed Albanians was achieve and in so doing, established the conditions for the peaceful resolution of the crisis that could well have engulfed this country. Essential Harvest succeeded in collecting and destroying 3,875 weapons over 30 days. Included were four tanks and armored personnel carriers that the so-called NLA have captured from the Macedonian security forces, 17 Strela-2M (NATO: SA-7b Grail) man-portable low-altitude air defense weapons systems, 161 anti-tank systems, 483 machine guns, 3,210 assault rifles and nearly 400,000 mines, explosives and ammunition. Because the armed insurgency was a manifestation of “discontent” among the ethnic Albanian community in the Republic of Macedonia, in accordance with the Ohrid Peace Agreement, constitutional changes has been made that are granting more rights to the ethnic Albanian minority that is 22.7 percent of the countries population of just over 2 million. In order to prevent a rise in ethnic conflicts after the termination of the NATO Operation Essential Harvest, the Macedonian government, the EU, and the OSCE agreed that international observers should supervised the orderly return of Macedonian security forces to the areas formerly held by ethnic Albanian extremists. In order to provide additional security to the international observers, while authorities of the Republic of Macedonia had primarily responsibility for their security, on September 26, 2001, NATO began restructuring Task Force Harvest (TFH) and the next day Operation Essential Harvest was replaced by Operation Amber Fox / Task Force Fox (TFF). Further democratization and improvement in human rights through the process of dialogue and reconciliation progressed significantly and the Operation Amber Fox was extended for a period of three months in March 2002 and again in July 2002. As a result of the greatly improved security in the country, authorities of the Republic of Macedonia and NATO finally decided to bring the mission to an end on December 15, 2002. The Operation Amber Fox was of great importance for Germany because for the first time in this country history the German Federal Armed Forces assumed leadership and logistics of a NATO military operation that was consisting of some 700 German and other NATO nation’s troops.”

(http://www.airserbia.com/magazin/bozinovski/eu-nato/eu-nato_in_macedonia.htm). In regards to developments with the Macedonians in Greece, on September 8th, 1995, members of the ethnic Macedonian political party in Greece, the RAINBOW PARTY, also known as the “VINOZHITO PARTY” in Macedonian, opened an office in Lerin. On January 19th, 1997 a Second Conference of the "RAINBOW" party was held in Lerin and was attended by 76 delegates of all local units. A Political Manifesto and Organizational Principles were adopted and a Central Council comprised of 19 members was elected. The Central Council held its first session in Voden on January 26th, 1997, and elected a five-member Political Secretariat, an Economic Commission, an Editors' Council, etc. In its Political Manifesto "RAINBOW" has aired its wish to cooperate with all democratic and anti-nationalist forces in the country in its struggle for peace and European integration. The RAINBOW PARTY is a member of the European Free Alliance which has been standing up for the rights of stateless nations, peoples and regions for decades. Other development with regards to the Macedonians in Greece includes the opening of the Greek branch of the European Bureau for Lesser Used Languages (EBLUL), an organization dedicated to the preservation of lesser used languages in Europe. Across the European Union, no fewer than forty million people speak languages in their everyday lives, which are different from the official language of the state in which they are living. At present this figure represents 10% of the total European population, but shortly, with the expansion of the Union, the number of people speaking a different language from the official language of their state will be much, much greater. Greece, too, is no exception; however vigorously the state may deny it, the facts tell their own story. A by no means negligible section of the Greek population is bilingual. It is not possible to provide precise figures, since none of the censuses carried out to date has included a question on language. The one exception was the census of 1920, yet the figures it yielded for the northern regions of the country were never published. Moreover, the long-standing policy of marginalization and suppression has succeeded, naturally enough, in reducing the actual number of those speaking the non-official languages. This hostile treatment of heteroglossy

in Greece had its beginnings in the early days of the modern Greek state, 170 years ago. In those areas of the country where Arvanitika was prevalent, every effort was made to discourage its use. There was perhaps some justification for this in the desperate efforts being made to unite the regional populations into a single Greek state, using as a means to this end a policy of homogenization of the various populations. Macedonians, such as Nase Parisis who is currently President of the Greek branch of EBLUL, are striving to introduce the Macedonian languages into the Greek educational system. In regards to development with the Macedonians in Bulgaria OMO Ilinden PIRIN was a political party of the Macedonian minority in Bulgaria. It was registered as a political party in 1999 and participated in municipal elections in October 1999, where it elected five local officials. However, on February 29, 2000, the Constitutional Court in Bulgaria declared OMO "Ilinden" - PIRIN unconstitutional. This was in direct violation of the right to freedom of association and the right to freedom from discrimination. The Bulgarian government refuses to acknowledge the existence of the large Macedonian minority in Pirin Macedonia and continues to violate its basic human rights. Members and supporters of OMO Ilinden PIRIN (political party and human rights organization) and OMO Ilinden (human and minority rights organization) have been videotaped, harassed, beaten, fined, and even imprisoned simply for asserting their ethnic Macedonian identity. In regards to current developments with the Macedonians in Albania, at the local elections held on February 18, 2007, a Macedonian from the party Macedonian Alliance for European Integration (MAEI) was, for the first time, elected as mayor. Edmond Temelko, a 36-year-old veterinarian turned politician won the mayoral position in Prespa municipality, making him the first Macedonian elected in Albania. Macedonians in Albania are still unable to fully exercise their basic human rights such as obtain schooling in their mother tongue, using Macedonian national symbols and participation in state institutions. Macedonians fought hard to register their political party, the Macedonian Alliance for European Integration with success which is a major accomplishment for Macedonians, because they demonstrated maturity and voted for themselves. By doing so they showed the Albanian society that they are part of it and will take an active role in dealing with issues in the country.

The Prespa municipality has nine towns, inhabited mostly by ethnic Macedonians who speak their own language and foster their own cultural heritage. The Macedonian language will become the second official language and all Macedonian landmarks will be given their original names which were changed during Enver Hodza’s regime.