MINORITIES IN GREECE - (1913-1939)

MINORITIES IN GREECE - (1913-1939)

The Macedonian population

With the annexation of 51% of Macedonia and Western Thrace, Greece ceased to be a nationally homogeneous state. Most of the population living in this part of Macedonia after the Balkan Wars was of non-Greek origin. According to the language spoken at home, i.e. by the family, 370,371 or 35.20% of the people living in Macedonia were Macedonians (mainly affiliated with the exarchate church), 274,052 or 25.05% were Turks, 236,755 or 22.50% were Greeks, 68,206 or 6.49% were Jews, 44,414 or 4.22% were Vlachs, etc. Thus, out of a total of 1,052,227 residents, 77.50% were non-Greeks and only 236,755 or 22.50% were Greeks by language.

After the 1913 Treaty of Bucharest was signed Greece initiated a policy to create one state, one nation, one language and one faith. It used this policy to expel the non-Greek indigenous population and colonize its occupied part of Macedonia and Thrace with so-called alien Greeks and Christian non-Greeks. Greece began a policy of ethnically cleansing the Macedonian population and the other non-Greek people living in its occupied territory with the Balkan Wars (1912-1913) and continued after the First World War.

On November 27, 1919, with the signing of the Neuilly Peace Accord, a convention was signed between Greece and Bulgaria for the “voluntary eviction” of foreigners living in those countries. By virtue of this convention 86,571 Macedonians were forced to leave Greek occupied Macedonia and go to Bulgaria. Using the Neuilly Peace Accord and the “voluntary” eviction of people, Greece carried out its first forced mass eviction of Macedonians from their ancestral homeland.

Greece continued with its policy of ethnically cleansing the Macedonian population even after the Greek-Turkish War (1920-1922). With the signing of the Lausanne Peace Treaty (1923) both Greece and Turkey used the opportunity to compulsorily evict Christians from Turkey and Muslims from Greece. On the basis of this agreement, another 44,082 Macedonian Muslims were forced out of Greek occupied Macedonia. Using the Lausanne Peace

Treaty, Greece carried out its second forced mass eviction of Macedonians from their ancestral homeland. By virtue of the Neuilly and Lausanne peace treaties, 127,374 people or 34.39% of the total Macedonian population were forced to leave Greek occupied Macedonia and go to Bulgaria or Turkey. Even with these massive evictions there were still 242,997 Macedonians living in Greek occupied Macedonia and were a majority in Kostur, Lerin and Voden Regions.

In parallel with these evictions, the Greek state implemented a policy of colonizing Greek occupied Macedonia with so-called Greek and non-Greek Christian people. The Greek state implemented this policy through the so-called “internal colonization” (with people from southern Greece) and “external colonization” (with non-Greek Christians from all over the world). In the period from 1913 to 1928, on the basis of “internal colonization”, Greece settled 53,056 people, and on the basis of “external colonization” Greece settled 565,143 non-Greek Christian colonists (so-called Greeks, Karamanli, Armenians and various other Caucasian peoples). In other words in the period from 1913 to 1928, Greece deposited 618,199 colonists and settlers in Greek occupied Macedonia who were culturally, traditionally and linguistically non-Greeks. With the change in the ethnic composition, the Greek state also changed Macedonia’s toponyms. All cities, villages, mountains, lakes, etc. received Greek sounding toponyms.

The changes in the ethnic composition however had ethno-linguistic, political and economic consequences. The most difficult were the ethno-linguistic changes. With the replacement of the population’s ethnic structure in Greek occupied Macedonia, the historical status of the Macedonian people was changed. From a majority living on its ancestral lands, the Macedonian people became an ethnic minority.

Similarly the so-called Greek population also changed its traditional status. From a minority (22%) it became a majority. The languages spoken also changed status. From the most used language, the Macedonian national language became the language of a minority. The statutes of the Greek language changed from being the language

of a minority to the official Greek language for the entire population living in Greek occupied Macedonia.

The new ethno-linguistic processes in Greek occupied Macedonia also affected the ethnic nomination of the new population. The Macedonian population called the newly arrived Greek-Christian colonists Madzhiri (aliens), or Auti or Kurkutadi. The colonist population called the Macedonian people Bulgars, Slavophones or endopi (natives). Over time, the Greek and non-Greek (Karamanli, Armenians, and various Caucasians) colonists or “prosfiges” (refugees in Greek) will be called “Greek Macedonians” and eventually “Macedonians”.

After all these changes that the Greek state made in Greek occupied Macedonia, the ethnic history of the Macedonian period ended and the history of the so-called Greek-Madzhir period began. With this change the Greek political borders began to increasingly coincide with the Greek national borders.

Policies of denationalization

Following the signing of the 1913 Treaty of Bucharest, the Greek state began to crack down on the Macedonian population that had Macedonian sentiments. It was forbidden for Macedonians to express another affiliation other than the Greek one. The Macedonian people were forced to change their Macedonian names and surnames. Every Macedonian surname was changed and had to end in “is”, “os”, or “poulos”.

After 1913 all Macedonian and Slavonic literacy was banned and those using it were persecuted. All Macedonian and Slavonic literacy was removed from churches, monuments and graves. All churches were meticulously examined and baptized with Greek names. All Macedonian and Slavonic inscriptions were removed from churches and from all other places and all Macedonian and Slavonic books were destroyed. The tombs of the Ilinden leaders and fighters were also destroyed.

Especially cruel was the attack on the Macedonian language. The Macedonian national language was banned outright and those

speaking it were persecuted. The worst attack on the Macedonian language came during Ioanis Metaxas’s dictatorship (1936). Metaxas prohibited the use of the Macedonian national language in everyday life in the village, in ordinary human communication, in the market, in weddings, in funerals, as well as in the privacy of the Macedonian home. At the same time, regardless of age, the Macedonian population was forced to attend evening schools to learn to speak Greek. All those who broke this rule suffered heavy and severe penalties (fined for breaking the so-called language rule, plucking moustaches, rubbing hot pepper on the tongue, being spit in the mouth, forced to drink castor oil, jailed, and many other physical abuses). Almost 4,500 Macedonians were found guilty of speaking the Macedonian language and were sent to serve jail sentences in the Greek islands.

Pressure exerted by the League of Nations in the period between the two world wars forced the Greek government to take formal measures and convince Europe that Greece respected the provisions it had signed for the protection of minority rights derived from the Paris Peace Accords. And because of this the Macedonian primer called the “Abecedar” was published in 1925. The primer was printed in the Latin alphabet using the Macedonian folk language (Lerin-Bitola dialect). Unfortunately, immediately after its publication, the primer was destroyed and never reached the hands of those for whom it was intended.

Assimilation policy

In the period between the two world wars, the Greek state implemented a policy of assimilation to assimilate the Macedonian population into the Greek fold. The entire political structure (education, church, army, etc.) was put into this service. It was in the Greek schools where the majority of Macedonians met the Greek language for the first time. Two hours of class time was dedicated to the study of language and history in order for students to learn Greek faster. All other subjects were taught through song and dance. Greece’s “glorious past” was especially praised and emphasised. Every child needed to know and be proud of being Greek. All children needed to know about the glorious battles their ancestors fought in Marathon, Thermopylae, etc., and about the “heroic and

glorious battles the Greek armed bands”, led by Pavlos Melas and Germanos Karavangelis, fought against “the criminal elements” (Macedonians) led by Lazo Pop Traikov, Pando Kliashev, Vasil Chakalarov, Mitre Pandzharov and others. The Macedonian people were forced to learn the Greek language by terror carried out by the Greek nationalist organization “Greek-Macedonian fist”, which existed everywhere and was present at all times. In their judgement the Macedonian people felt more oppressed by the Greeks than they were by the Ottomans before them. They often cursed the Ottomans for leaving them in the hands of the Greeks. And when one asked a Macedonian what they thought of the Ottomans and the Greeks, they would often say: “The Ottomans had no faith but had compassion... The Greeks have neither faith nor compassion…”

The Macedonian population continuously and strongly resisted Greek attempts to denationalize and assimilate it with the Macedonian family playing a major role in this resistance. The Macedonian family nurtured and orally and secretly communicated the Macedonian language, history, culture and traditions from one generation to the next. Despite the dangers faced for speaking it, the Macedonian language was present in everyday communications. This contributed to the preservation of the Macedonian national language and statutes as a “mother tongue” among the Macedonian people who learned it at their earliest age and expressed it naturally. They learned the Greek language later, in school, and considered it a foreign and secondary language.

The Macedonian family fostered everything that was Macedonian; the language, culture, traditions, history… and passed it on to the next generation. The new generations not only learned about Ilinden and the epic Macedonian struggles and the leaders and fighters involved in them, but also about the Greek criminal acts perpetrated by the so-called “Greek heroes” led by Pavlos Melas and Germanos Karavangelis. While the Greek state was “illuminating” the Macedonian children about glorious Greek acts in school during the day, the family was ruining their “illumination” with the truth during the evening.

The Turkish population

After the First World War, almost 460,000 Turks lived in Greek occupied Macedonia and Western Thrace (310,000 in Greek occupied Macedonia and 150,000 in Western Thrace). Based on the Lausanne agreement, 310,000 Turks were forced to leave Greek occupied Macedonia and go to Turkey. An exception to this mandatory eviction was the Turkish population living in Western Thrace (Rhodopes, Xanthi and Maritsa) and the so-called Greek population living in Istanbul. According to the same Lausanne agreement, the Turks in Greece were given the status of a Muslim minority.

The Turkish minority in Greece enjoyed freedom without having any freedom. After the mandatory exchange of populations between Greece and Turkey and the colonization of the 100,000 so-called Christian Greeks in Western Thrace, the Turkish and other Muslim populations were faced with immense daily pressures. The new colonists, with “discretionary” help from the Greek authorities, began to usurp Turkish properties and force the Turks into “voluntary” eviction. The law governing Muslim vacancies in Turkey specified that vacant lands belong exclusively to the Muslims. With this, the interests of the Turkish minority were obviously protected, but essentially it also had an anti-Turkish character. This law did not permit Muslims to acquire new lands, and thus prevented Muslim expansion. This anti-Turkish Greek policy was especially applied during the Metaxas dictatorship. By law no. 1366 the Greek state prohibited the sale of land to members of the Muslim population.

The Jewish population

In the period before the Balkan Wars almost 80,000 Jews, or 3% of the total population, lived in Macedonia. After Macedonia’s partition, 68% of that total lived in Greek occupied Macedonia, and 7,200 lived in Serbian occupied Macedonia. A large part of the Jewish population in Greek occupied Macedonia was concentrated mainly in Solun which seriously contributed to the economic and cultural development of the city. During the Ottoman occupation the

Jewish population lived freely and was allowed to develop ethnically, economically and culturally.

Jealous of the Jewish population’s wealth and economic abilities, after gaining control of Greek occupied Macedonia, Greek authorities began to crack down on the Jews. After the First World War they began to show contempt for the Jewish people. Immediately after 1918, all Jews aged 15 to 50 were forced to clean the city streets and remove dead bodies from them. Those who avoided their obligations were robbed of their food rations and forced to do even harsher jobs.

At the same time, the Jewish population was harassed and put under immense psychological pressure. Even for the slightest offense, most often invented by the Greek authorities themselves, Jewish merchants were often given hefty fines. Their shop windows were frequently broken and their shops burned down. Sometimes pressures on the Jews took violent forms. A group of young Greek people in Solun organized the so-called “Black gang” which physically attacked and harassed Jews in the streets.

This harassment by the Greek authorities upset the Jewish population in Greek occupied Macedonia to a point where they sought international protection. A three-member Jewish delegation was sent to Paris during the Paris Peace Accords to seek protection from the Great Powers. But that did not stop the Greeks who exerted even more pressure on the Jews and forced them to go to Italy, Switzerland and France. In the period between the two world wars, the Jewish population also developed independent educational, cultural and religious (synagogues) organizations on its own.

The Vlach population

The Vlach population that lived in Macedonia was small in number. Before the Balkan wars 80,767 Vlachs or 3.58% of the total population lived in Macedonia. After Macedonia’s partition (1913) 44,114 Vlachs or 6.11% of the entire Vlach population lived in Greek occupied Macedonia. The Vlachs in Macedonia were not ethnically homogeneous and did not express one single Vlach ethnic consciousness. They expressed themselves as either Greeks (so-

called “Greek-Vlachs”) or as Romanians (so-called “Romanian-Vlachs”). The Greek government, however, had a different attitude towards the Vlachs. It supported the “Greek-Vlachs” and persecuted “Romanian-Vlachs”.

Under Greek pressure, in the period between the two world wars, the “Romanian-Vlachs” were forced to go to Romania and colonize Southern Dobrudzha, a Bulgarian territory annexed by Romania after the Second Balkan War. The first Vlach families that landed in Romania in October 1925 traveled on the ship “Iashi”. They were from Ber, Voden, Meglen and Katerini Regions in Greek occupied Macedonia. In the period from 1925 to 1937, 6,000 Vlach families were evicted from all of Macedonia and were settled in Southern Dobrudzha (Kaliakra and Durostor). As a result of the Treaty of Kraiova (September 7, 1940) 67,000 Bulgarians were compulsorily evicted from Northern Dobrudzha and 83,000 Romanian-Vlachs were deposited in the same region. The Vlachs from Macedonia were deposited in Northern Dobrudzha.

The Vlach population from Macedonia that was moved to Romania did not refer to itself by its true ethnic name. The Romanian authorities referred to the “Romanian-Vlachs” from Macedonia by their political ethnic name “Macedonian-Romanians” and they themselves, in face of the Romanian public, referred to themselves as “Makidon” (Macedonians). The name “Armini” (Vlachs) was used only when communicating among themselves.

The Bulgaromohamedans (Pomaks), the Albanians and the Roma

The second highest number of people (35,000) belonging to the Muslim faith were the Pomaks who lived mainly in Western Thrace, Xanthi Region, the Rhodope Mountains and the villages along Maritsa. They were Muslims by religious affiliation but Bulgarians by ethnic origin. The language they spoke at home was Bulgarian. But, even though the Greek state respected their religious freedoms as guaranteed by the Lausanne peace treaty, it did not recognize the Pomaks as ethnic Bulgarians… only as Muslim Greeks. The Albanians in Epirus (Chameria Region), on the other hand, were subjected to denationalization and assimilation.

The CPG and the Macedonian National Question (1924-1940)

The Communist Party of Greece (CPG), unlike other Greek civil parties, had a different attitude with respect to the Macedonian question. But its attitude was not independent and autonomous. The CPG only dealt with the Macedonian question because it was a Comintern decision but the Comintern itself was a “branch” of the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs which carried out its national policy depending on USSR state interests.

The Soviet Union was not a guarantor of the Paris Peace Accords. Regarding the Versailles political status quo, there were four USSR policy periods: (1) The anti-Revolutionary period (1919-1935), (2) The pro-Versailles period (1935-August 1939), (3) the anti-Versailles period (August 1939-June 22, 1941), and (4) The anti-Fascist period (June 22, 1941-1945).

During the anti-Versailles period the USSR sought to destroy the European version of the status quo created by the Paris Peace Accords. Through the use of “national questions” the Comintern implemented a policy that sought the break-up of the Versailles successor states Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Romania and Greece. During the anti-Versailles and pro-Versailles periods the Comintern was in favour of two policies regarding the Macedonian national question: a) A “United and Independent Macedonia (1924-1935)”, i.e. a “State without a nation”, and b) A “nation without a state”, i.e. respect for minority rights within the Greek state (after 1935).

During the period when the Comintern recognized a “State without a nation” it recognized a Macedonian state but not a Macedonian nation. The existence of the Macedonian ethnicity was not recognized during this period. Again, during the period when the Comintern recognized a “State without a nation”, the CPG, as well as the Comintern, felt that there was a diversity of peoples living in Macedonia (mainly Bulgarians, Greeks, Jews, Vlachs etc.) and none of the nationalities living on this territory were reflected in the name Macedonia. And Macedonia, the name of this territory, was not reflected in the name of any of the nationalities living in that region.

The CPG adopted the Comintern policy for a “United and Independent Macedonia” during its Party’s Third Extraordinary Congress held in Athens in 1924. The CPG’s adaptation of this policy (United and Independent Macedonia) caused long and bitter debates in its ranks. As a result the Party split into two groups with regards to solving the Macedonian National Question. On the one hand there was the so-called “Minority” group led by Ianis Kordatos and Tomas Apostolidis which was against a “United and Independent Macedonia” and on the other hand there was the so-called “Majority” group led by Pantelis Puliopoulos which was in favour of the Comintern policy regarding the Macedonian National Question.

The “Minority” group believed that, after the many population exchanges that took place in Greek occupied Macedonia, there was no longer a need for such a policy and the idea of a “United and Independent Macedonia” had passed its time. Ianis Kordatos, leader of the “Minority” group, in an article for the CPG newspaper “Rizospastis”, wrote: “…such a policy is unrealistic because the majority of the population in Greek-Macedonia is Greek…” The so-called “Minority” group warned the “Majority” group that by adopting the Comintern’s policy on the Macedonian National Question, the Party would lose support and “arm the Greek bourgeoisie” with a dangerous weapon to slander and attack the CPG.

The “Majority” group however defended the Comintern policy, its decision, and its “class” position, and at the same time believed that its policies were correct and revolutionary. When the CPG, during its Third Extraordinary Congress, took a vote to accept or reject the Comintern policy regarding the Macedonian National Question, 17 members voted to accept it and 2 voted to reject it. Unfortunately the “Majority” group’s victory was a Pyrrhic victory. Shortly after the CPG’s Third Extraordinary Congress, 8 members who voted to accept the policy withdrew their support. As it turned out the 1924 “Majority” group in reality was in the minority and the “real” majority lay in the so-called “Minority” group. The Greek “bourgeoisie” reacted immediately and harshly right after the CPG adopted this policy. Then in 1925, Dictator T. Pangalos organized the well-known anti-Communist processes in Athens and in July

1929, E. Venizelos passed law number 4,229 which prohibited all communist activities in the entire country.

The political clashes between Leo Trotsky on the one hand and I. V. Stalin on the other, taking place in the ranks of the USSR’s League of Communists, caused ideological cleavages in the ranks of the CPG. A new “Minority” group, led by Puliopoulos (Trotskyites) emerged on one side and a “Majority” group led by Georgios Siantos and Nikos Zahariadis (Stalinists) emerged on the other. The CPG ideological clashes were further complicated by the emergence of the so-called “Centre” group led by S. Maximos, K. Sklavos and T. Heinoglu, who had greater sympathy for the “Minority” group. On November 1, 1927, representatives from the “Centre” and “minority” groups (Puliopoulos, Iatopoulos, Nikolino, etc.) created the so-called “United Opposition” and through the “Spartacus” magazine continued their political struggle against the Stalinist majority which, with help from the Comintern, won the party’s leadership. The formation of the organization “Greek Communist Internationalists” (OKDE, later EOKDE) will in the future turn into the Communist Party of Greece-Internationalists, a section of the Fourth International. Because of his political activities P. Puliopoulos, former Secretary General of the CPG, was removed from the party. Then, with help from the Comintern, the CPG leadership was taken over by the Orthodox Stalinist Nikos Zahariadis, a Madzhir from Asia Minor.

In the period from 1931 to 1935, the Comintern, as well as the CPG, would gradually reject the policy of a “United and Independent Macedonia” (a State without a nation) and implement the policy of a “Nation without a state”, i.e. a policy of full equality for minorities within the Greek state. By adopting the policy of a “nation without a state”, the CPG in fact rejected the policy of diversity of nations and recognized the existence of a separate Macedonian ethnicity. The CPG concluded that the Macedonians are not Greeks, Serbians or Bulgarians, and that the Macedonian language is a separate Slavic language. The newspaper “Rizospastis” even published articles under the title “With the Macedonians in Macedonia” about the difficult political and economic situation the Macedonian population was facing in the period from 1932 to 1935.

At its 6th CPG Congress, held in December 1935, the CPG officially adopted the policy of full equality for minorities in Greece. After accepting the new political orientation in relation to the Macedonian National Question, a CPG delegation, led by Vasilis Nefeloudis, went to Moscow to convince the Comintern to implement the new CPG orientation in relation to the Macedonian National Question. The Comintern, represented by G. Dimitrov, D. Manoilsky, P. Toliati, K. Gotfald, etc., accepted the arguments presented by the CPG representatives and adopted the decision taken by the CPG 6th Congress regarding the Macedonian National Question. After 1935 however, instead of calling the Macedonians “Macedonians” the CPG began to increasingly use the word “Slavo-Macedonians”.