2. THE NEUILLY CONVENTION AND THE SO-CALLED “VOLUNTARY” EXCHANGE OF POPULATION

2. THE NEUILLY CONVENTION AND THE SO-CALLED “VOLUNTARY” EXCHANGE OF POPULATIONS BETWEEN GREECE AND BULGARIA

After the First World War, Europe was politically re-configured. The new Versailles Europe was far from being a secure political framework for a European political establishment. The territorial problems that existed between France and Germany, Hungary and Romania, Czechoslovakia and the USSR, Yugoslavia and Hungary, Austria and Yugoslavia, Albania and Yugoslavia, Yugoslavia and Italy, Austria and Italy, Greece and Bulgaria, the USSR and Romania, Poland and Germany, (like Alsace and Lorraine, Erdey (or Transylvania), Carpathian Ukraine, Voivodina, Korushka, Kosovo, Istria, South Tyrol, Western Thrace, Bessarabia and Severna Bukovina, Shlionsk and Pomorie) as well as the existence of unsettled national questions (like the Macedonian, Basque, and Flemish), created territorial problems on the one hand, and unresolved national questions on the other, which in themselves seriously destabilized the political situation in Europe. In 1922, in addition to the French language, the Flemish language became an official language in Belgium. Before that there was no notable national Flemish existence in Belgium. But after Versailles the Flemish population demanded economic, cultural and linguistic affirmation in the regions where Flemish people lived. There was almost no country in existence in southeastern Europe which had just a single nation or people. Multiple nationalities, more or less, were present in all of them. In Finland, for example, the dominant nation represented 89.3% of the total population, in Estonia 88.2%, in Bulgaria 83.2%, in Lithuania 80.4%, in Romania 76%, in Poland 69.1%, while in Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia the dominant nations represented only 42% of the total population.

The Balkans was a synthesis and a classical example of unresolved national and territorial issues. After the Treaty of Versailles, no Balkan nation was nationally homogeneous. In Yugoslavia, for example, out of a total of 12,055,688 inhabitants as it was in 1924, the largest nation (the Serbians) did not even account for half of the total population. In Yugoslavia, of the total 12,055,688 people, 7 million were Croatians, Slovenes, Macedonians, Montenegrins, Albanians and today’s Muslims. Each one of these people felt like they were a different nation.

The situation was similar in the Romanian Kingdom. With the creation of a “Greater Romania” after receiving Southern Dobrudia, Erdey, Beasarabia, Severna Bukovina and the Romanian Banat, Romania became a very nationally diverse country. In addition to Romanians there were 1,500,000 Hungarians, 800,000 Germans, 400,000 Bulgarians, 300,000 Russians and more than one million Jewish people spread across the whole territory of Versailles Romania.

After its large territorial expansion to non-Greek historical territories, the Greek kingdom ceased to be nationally homogeneous. More than 1 million non-Greeks lived in Greek occupied Macedonia and Western Thrace alone.

About 16.8% of the entire population living in Bulgaria following the Neuilly Convention was non-Bulgarian which included a large Macedonian minority as well as a Turkish and Armenian minority.

After Versailles, Europe was left with many unresolved national, territorial and minority problems. The principle that was accepted for resolving these problems was respect and recognition of minority rights within the newly created states. Respect for minority rights was also foreseen in the peace agreements with Poland, Romania, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Greece, etc. An exception to this principle was put in the peace agreement between Greece and Bulgaria. The Greek-Bulgarian agreement called for theoretical respect of minority rights, but also with the right for minorities to “voluntarily” leave. Based on Article 56 of the Neuilly Convention, on November 27, 1919, Greece and Bulgaria signed an agreement calling for Greeks in Bulgaria to “voluntarily” leave and go to Greece and for Bulgarians in Greece to “voluntarily” leave and go to Bulgaria.

What was to be “voluntary” the Greek government immediately turned into “compulsory” and began to evict the Macedonian population from Greek occupied Macedonia. The Greek authorities began implementing a policy of state terror which forced

Macedonians to “voluntarily” move to Bulgaria. This daily terror, maltreatment, killings and confiscation of properties, forced many Macedonians, who were no longer sure if they would “see the next day”, to leave. (Macedonian Archives (AM), Foundation of the Macedonian National Committee (MNK), 1912-1913, k. no. 3.) Part of the Macedonian population was evicted from Greek occupied Macedonia under such conditions:

Macedonian people expelled from Greek occupied Macedonia to Bulgaria in the period from 1913 to 1928. (Rumenov Vladimir, Blgaria v Makedonia pod Grchka vlast, Macedonian Review (MP), Sofia, book 4, page 90.)

Region

Kukush Seres Zrnev Demir Hisar Solun Enidzhe-Vardar Gumenche Drama Kostur Solun (without the city) Lerin Laganda Zhnies Meglen Voden Kailari Nigrita Ber From the southern regions

Total

People expelled

18,989 11,404 11,223 10,756 7,285 7,257 5,195 4,233 3,577 1,782 1,676 1,581 1,442 1,233 449 381 326 114 285

86,582

The expelled Macedonian population that was forced to cross the Bulgarian border left everything behind; relatives, land, houses, livestock… everything was left behind to accommodate the new

colonists. According to eyewitness accounts: “The expelled Macedonians left Bansko and Gorno-Dzhumaisko in the morning and the colonists arrived in the afternoon... This went on for days...” (V. “Nova Makedonija”, 19 IX 1975, p. 5.)

Initially, the Greek state began to colonize the various places where Macedonians were expelled and replaced with so-called Greeks from inside Greece. The internal colonization was silent but persistent. This “internal” colonization that began after 1913, in various forms, is still ongoing today. In the brief historical period, from 1913 to 1928, various Greek governments brought into Greek occupied Macedonia 53,056 colonists who originated from Greek territories.

Territorial origin of Greek colonists deposited in Greek occupied Macedonia (1913-1928)

(Statistika apotelezmata tis apografis tu plithizmu tis Elados tis 15-16 maiu 1928, Topos geniseos, Hriskia ke glosa, ipikotis, Athina, 1935.)

Region Number %

Thessaly 11,346 21.39 Sterea Hellas and Euboea 9,752 18.39 Peloponnesus 7,727 14.57 Epirus 6,757 12.73 Aegean Islands 5,764 10.86 Western Thrace 5,350 10.09 Crete 3,360 6.33 Ionian Islands 1,766 3.32 Kiklades 1,234 2.32

Total 53,056 100

These so-called internal Greek colonists were deposited in Greek occupied Macedonia.

Greek colonists deposited in various regions inside Greek occupied Macedonia (1913-1928) (Statistika apotelezmata tis apografis tu plithizmu tis Elados tis 15-16 maiu 1928, Topos geniseos, Hriskia ke glosa, ipikotis, Athina, 1935.)

Region

Solun Kavala Drama Seres Kozhani Lerin Pela Chalkidiki Sveta Gora

Total

Number %

26,324 44.6 7,610 14.3 4.830 9.1 4,178 8.0 3,877 7.3 1,777 3.3 1,554 3.0 1,611 3.0 1,295 2.4

53,056 100

With the colonization shown on the table above, the regions in Greek occupied Macedonia began to experience demographic change. Major demographic changes began to appear in eastern and central Greek occupied Macedonia in regions such as Seres, Demir-Hisar, Kukush, etc. In addition to the so-called “voluntary eviction”, the Greek state found creative ways to reduce the Macedonian population. One of those ways was to not allow Macedonians who, for some reason or another, went abroad, to return home. The names of these Macedonians were kept in so-called “black books” and these people were strictly forbidden from returning to their native places.