NOTES

NOTES

(1) The Athens supported right-wing Greek press termed the Greek Civil War (1946-1949) “Antisimritikos Agonas” (Anti-bandit War). In other words, the part of the War led by Greek Generals and government forces was not called a “Civil War” but an “Anti-bandit War”. But in due time, after the Democratic Army of Greece was defeated, the “Anti-bandit War” slowly started to be referred to as the “Civil War” (Εµφύλιος Πόλεµος).

(2) According to the old calendar, a Peace Conference was held in Bucharest from July 17 to July 28, 1913 at the conclusion of the Second Balkan War during which time the 1913 Treaty of Bucharest was signed. Greece and Serbia as victors of this war received 89 percent of Macedonia’s territory while defeated Bulgaria received 11 percent.

Behind Greece and Serbia, at the conference, stood France and the UK, while Bulgaria was hoping that Russia and Austria-Hungary would help. At least half of the negotiations were spent over whether the port of Kavala would be given to Bulgaria (which Russia favored) or to Greece (which France and the UK did everything in their power to prevent Russia from gaining access to the Aegean Sea through Bulgaria).

(3) The book “Pette sudbonosni godini vo Egejska Makedonija (1945-1949) (“Five vital years in Aegean Macedonia (1945-1949)”) was written by Dr. Risto Kiriazovski and after his death, published by the “Association of Refugee Children from Aegean Macedonia”. Risto Kiriazovski was born on January 6, 1927. He was enlisted in DAG and fought in the Greek Civil War. He defected to the People’s Republic of Macedonia in 1949, before the war ended. In 1981 he earned his PhD in history, specializing in the affairs of NOF and other organizations in Greek occupied Macedonia from 1945 to 1949. In 1987 he retired. He died in 2002 in Skopje.

(4) The Yalta Conference lasted from February 4 to 11, 1945 and was attended by Churchill, Stalin and Roosevelt, in the presence of their foreign ministers.

(5) Some Western diplomats have dated the Macedonian question to 1870, when Russia pressured the Ottoman Empire to allow the establishment of a separate Orthodox Church, later termed the Bulgarian Orthodox Church or the Exarchate Church, with authority over parts of the Ottoman province of Macedonia. Others hold the view that this issue dates back to 1878, when the Berlin Congress was convened to revise the Treaty of San Stefano, which Russia imposed on the Ottoman Empire after the Russo-Turkish War. Under the Treaty of San Stefano, Bulgaria was to expand its boundaries and realize its Bulgarian national dreams when it received all of Vardar Macedonia as well as other parts of Macedonia including Vranie, Kostur, Lerin, Ostrovo and a small part of the Aegean Sea, west of Solun. At the Congress of Berlin however, Russia renounced the Treaty of San Stefano resulting in Macedonia being returned to the Ottoman Empire. (See documents: UK and Macedonia (1944-1945)).

(5a) Here is the relevant part of [R20451/1009/67]:

December 11, 1944, Mr. Leeper to Mr. Eden, Athens 24th November, 1944

The problem of the Western Macedonian Bulgarophones, who are briefly mentioned in paragraph 7 of the paper, also remains serious and formidable, in spite of its limited dimensions. This minority, which extends through the region from Florina and Kastoria through Siatista to the plain of Yannitsa, has proved exceedingly unreliable during the war. Satisfactory data are not available, but it appears from events during the occupation that the dissatisfied minority must be considerably larger than is suggested by Greek census figures; and it is certain that successive Greek Governments have shirked facing the problem and have preferred to persuade even themselves that it did not exist. On the assumptions (1) that the policy of His Majesty’s Government is to treat Greece as the most important Balkan country from the point of view of British interests, and to support those elements in Greece which are most stably pro-British and (2) that Greece does not wish to belong to a Balkan Federation in which there would be a large Slav majority, it would appear to follow that Greece had better not contain any Slav minorities at all. And since the amputation of the Slav areas in Western Macedonia and their annexation to a Slav Federation is a practical impossibility and would also be economically disastrous for Greece. It would follow that, difficult as it may be, a home must be found for perhaps 120,000 Slav Macedonians north of the Greek frontiers of 1941.

(6) The fighters of ELAS were often referred to as the ELASiti (members of ELAS) and the “Andartes”. “Andartes” was the name given to the Greek bands that roamed the Macedonian landscape and terrorized the Macedonian people right after the failed 1903 Ilinden Uprising. The “Andartes” were the instrument used to terrorize Macedonians into becoming Greeks.

On April 6, 1941 Germany launched an attack against Yugoslavia and Greece. At the same time a new master with new fascist views appeared inside Greece. On September 27, 1941 the organization National Liberation Front (EAM) was established and invited the entire Greek population to join the resistance against fascism. During a joint meeting between the CPG Central Committee and EAM a decision was made to establish a military wing, the Greek People’s Liberation Army (ELAS) which was then launched on February 15, 1942. The first unit of ELAS was formed in Kostur on December 7, 1942 and was joined by 10 Macedonians, 7 Greeks and 2 Vlachs. ELAS at its peak, throughout Greece, numbered about 70,000 fighters.

On July 16, 1943 the ELAS leadership and head of the English Military Mission, Colonel Eddie Myers signed an agreement putting ELAS under English control in the Middle East Command. On February 12, 1945 the Varkiza Agreement was signed in which the left practically handed over governing of Greece to the right.

(7) The Slavo-Macedonian National Liberation Front (SNOF) was formed in October 1943 in the village Osnichani, Kostur Region by the CPG Committee secretary for Western Macedonia, Hristos Kalfas-Andreas, the CPG Secretary for the District Committee of Kostur, Antonis Andonopoulos-Periklis and by the CPG Secretary for the District Committee of Kozheni Region, Thanassis Kartsounis. A so-called Macedonian organization was created for the sole purpose of attracting as many Macedonian fighters as possible. SNOF was allowed to recruit only for a short period of time, after that its fighters were subordinated to ELAS. On September 16, 1944 all military units belonging to the Slavo-Macedonian National Liberation Army (SNOB) were disbanded. Through the Kazerta (a small town in Italy) Agreement, signed by the CPG, EAM, ELAS and the Greek government, on September 26, 1944 Georgios Papandreou and the British headquarters for the Middle East were given the right to form a government in Greece.

With this agreement the fate of the Left and the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia, who placed all their trust and hopes in the CPG, was definitely sealed!

(8) The Party newspaper “Laiki Foni” published Bukerdzis’s famous interview in which he announced to the world that the Macedonians were “Bulgaro-phone Greeks”. General Stefanos Sarafis, Supreme Commander of ELAS, in his famous book, “O ELAS” (1946, 331), refers to the Macedonians as “Slavo-phone Greeks”. But if that were the case then why did Greece exchange populations with Bulgaria after the Balkan Wars as per the Neuilly Convention 14 from November 11, 1919 and with Turkey as per the 1923 Lausanne Peace Treaty? The Macedonian people at that time had already lost their ethnic and territorial status. In World War II Greece eliminated this issue when the commanders of ELAS, EAM and the CPG signed the Lebanon agreement on July 16, 1943, the Kazerta agreement on September 26, 1944 and the Varkiza agreement on February 12, 1945. The Macedonian issue was further eliminated when English Colonel Eddie Myers promised Greece that Britain would protect its territorial integrity and that the current borders would remain as they were. This further proves that the developments in the Balkans after World War II were unattainable, simply a shot in the dark at best. So why start the Greek Civil War? This was the work of the CPY and the CPG to create chaos, to push the Macedonian people into annihilation, to spill rivers of blood, to eliminate and exile the entire Macedonian nation from Greek occupied Macedonia. Given all this, then it makes sense that these demagogues who then pushed for a “United Macedonia” must have been aware of the lies they were spreading. They officially held the position that the Macedonian question was a threat to the peace in the Balkans and something had to be done so they, serving the interests of foreigners, pushed us into this senseless war in order to have us killed or have us permanently evicted from our homeland. They knew that given the option we would have preferred to stay home in our historic homeland, even if we had to live without an identity!

Here is how the CPG Central Committee’s bi-weekly magazine, the “Komep” number 16 of August 1943, explains the Macedonian situation: “There is no national mix in Greek Macedonia... the Slavic and Turkish population was evicted under the various conventions and replaced with a Greek population collected from all the countries in the Balkans and Asia Minor... Macedonia has now become so Greek that it is same as any territory in old Greece!” (p 331.) And what do we Macedonians say, even to this day, we say that these Greeks were our most faithful allies and we would like to live with them like brothers! There is an old Macedonian folk saying which explains our behaviour perfectly: “Our suffering is our own doing!”

(9) Naum Peiov was born in 1919 in the village Gabresh, Kostur Region. He was a member of the pre-war CPG. In 1939 he was arrested by the Greek police. He joined NOV in 1941. He was Commander of the Macedonian Partisan Detachment “Lazo Trpovski”. He was a member of the SNOF Kostur District Committee. He led a group of fighters who left the ranks of ELAS and fled to Vardar Macedonia in May 1944. He was Deputy Commander of the First Aegean Brigade. After the war he served in a variety of high political and social functions in the Socialist Republic of Macedonia.

(10) In essence two organizations were formed: SNOF for Kostur Region, established in October 1943, and SNOF for Lerin Region, established in November 1943 in the village Belkamen. The creation of SNOF for Lerin Region was premeditated by EAM in accordance with Tempo’s proposal which called for SNOF to work together with ELAS in order to win over the Kostur fighters. The Lerin Organization was strictly controlled by the EAM and ELAS Greek leadership. SNOF was supposed to be one organization representing all the Macedonian people from the entire part of Aegean Macedonia. It was supposed to be an independent organization working outside of EAM but supported by the CPG. It is worth mentioning here that in January 1944, the CPG allowed the formation of a Slavo-Macedonian army called SNOV and placed it under the direct leadership of EAM and ELAS. Later it was from this “army” that the “Aegean Brigade” was formed and transferred to Tito’s Army in Yugoslavia. It is also worth mentioning here that in Skopje, on April 23, 1945, the organizations NOF, AFZH and NOMS were formed under the initiative of the CPY/CPM and sent to organize the Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia in preparation of a new conflict - the Greek Civil War.

(11) Tsvetko Uzunovski – Abas was responsible for OZNA. During a CPM Central Committee Plenum, held in the summer of 1945, Uzunovski proposed that a “frontal stance” be taken against a group of people who broke away from the Party. Included in this group were: Chento, Venko Markovski, Apostolski, Kiro Gligorov, Lazar Sokolov, Petre Piruze and Blagoi Hadzhi Panzov, all assisted by Dimitar Vlahov.

(12) My extensive research aims to discover: who helped (hindered) the peaceful Macedonian people in Greek occupied Macedonia after Macedonia’s partition (1913) to preserve (leave) their age-old traditional values, civilization and ethnic land, to come under attack and to experience genocide?

(13) In its March 21, 1945 Central Committee Politburo Session, the Yugoslav State Party leadership was all for the “construction of socialism” in Macedonia as recommended by Miha Marinko. The meeting was concluded by Tito remarking that Macedonia has not yet outlived “Mihailoism” which “lives in the bourgeois and in the peasants. The Party has popularized them, they should concretely renounce it and Macedonia should support itself. Chento needs to be scrubbed in the Party and Vlahov needs to be here. The ‘Question’ about these people should be carefully resolved... Macedonia has not yet given for this war. We must ask it to give more for the war and for the reconstruction of the country…” Soon

after that the CPM Central Committee Plenum was held. See: Tsvetko Uzunov-Abas’s position.

(14) Here is what Churchill wrote in his memoirs about the Balkans: We arrived in Moscow in the late hours of October 9, 1944. We had our first significant meeting and counseling in the Kremlin the next day, October 10. Attending the meeting were Stalin, Molotov, Eden and myself. The Majors Boris and Popov performed the translations… An agreement was reached on the division of spheres of influence. Under this deal, Greece was entirely left to the British sphere of influence, with rights, if necessary at any time to be able to intervene with all possible means.

(15) Nikos Zahariadis was born on April 27, 1903 in Edirne, Eastern Thrace. His father was employed as a clerk at “Razim”, a French commercial tobacco company based in Constantinople. From 1911 to 1912 Nikos Zahariadis lived and attended school in the “Ibin Paiko” settlement in Skopje, where his father worked as a representative of the “Razim” Company. In 1913 he moved to Solun. In 1922 and 1923 he worked as a sailor, a job which took him to the Soviet Union where he became a member of the Communist Party. In 1924, with the exchange of populations between Turkey and Greece, Zahariadis’s family was moved to Greece. In 1924 he visited the famous Communist University of Eastern European nations KUTVE in Moscow. Nikos Zahariadis was leader of the Greek communist movement and secretary general of the CPG from 1936 to 1956. Zahariadis treated the CPG like a cult and had absolute confidence in Stalin and his Communist Party, which he believed to be infallible. He himself admitted to this. Zahariadis committed suicide in 1973 while serving a prison sentence in Sorgun, Siberia.

(16) As a consequence of the Balkan Wars (1912-1913) and the 1913 Treaty of Bucharest signed August 10, 1913, and sanctioned by the Neuilly Agreement, signed August 10, 1920, Macedonia was divided between Greece, Serbia, Bulgaria and Albania. Albania later was awarded Mala Prespa and Golo Brdo. Greece received 34,356 km2 or 51% of the Macedonia’s ethnic and historical territory; Serbia received 25,713 km2 or 39%; Bulgaria received 6798 km2 or 9.5% and Albania received 0.5%.

(17) See: a) Neuilly Convention and b) Treaty of Lausanne.

(18) During the communist movement in 1924, with support from left-wing political forces, an agreement was reached to recognize the VMRO (United) Organization which was to represent all parts of Macedonia and special interests of the Macedonian people. A Declaration and a Manifesto were issued in April and May of 1924, defining the character and program of this Organization. According to its program objectives, among other things, “VMRO (United), in its capacity, was a real revolutionary force that fought for the freedom of the torn apart parts of Macedonia as a completely autonomous (independent) political unit in its natural ethnographic and geographic boundaries…”

During the March 1924, 6th Balkan Communist Conference, recognized by the Communist International, the Bulgarian proposal for the creation of a “United and Independent Macedonia” within a “Balkan Federation” was formally accepted. Then during the Communist International 5th World Congress held in May 1924 the same proposal was accepted by the CPY and CPG. CPG representatives, Pouliopoulos and Maksimos as well as representatives of the Yugoslav Communist Party, who were in attendance at this Congress and did not want to be seen as rocking the “Communist International boat” were obliged to accept the resolution. And because this resolution was recommended by the Communist International, the CPY was obliged to accept it at its 3rd CPY Congress, held in Vienna in June 1926. The same resolution was confirmed during the 4th CPY Congress held in October 1928.

(19) The “First Aegean Brigade” was formed in free Bitola on November 18, 1944 from the fighters of the two battalions that fled Greek occupied Macedonia. This Brigade was deployed on December 28, 1944 in Western Macedonia, mainly in Kichevo, Tetovo and Gostivar, tasked with fighting Dzhemo Mefail’s gang of balisti formed during the Italian-German occupation. The “First Aegean Brigade” was disbanded by special order number 236 (strictly confidential) issued by Marshal Tito on April 2, 1945.

(20) In the 20th century, after Macedonia was partitioned in 1913 and after the Second World War ended, little Macedonia’s were created in Australia, in the United States of America and in Canada. During the Greek Civil War (1945-1949) more than 20 thousand Macedonians gave their lives for Macedonia, others ended up in the Greek prisons and many more found refuge in Eastern European countries such as the USSR, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania etc., thus creating even more little Macedonia’s. But in their soul, all Macedonian immigrants longed to be in their homeland Macedonia, wishing every moment and wanting to return and gather together their families.

For some, their wish came true after relations between the USSR and Yugoslavia began to improve. Many stranded in the USSR and in other Eastern European countries were allowed to return to the Republic of Macedonia but only as political emigrants. Unfortunately, upon their return, the first institution they were welcomed in was “Idrizovo” Prison. There, in the prison, the first thing their compatriots tried to do was determine if they were “Yugoslav oriented”, if they were loyal to Tito. In other words they would allow them to return to Macedonia not because they were Macedonians but because they were loyal to Tito! Here UDBA rules were more valid than feeling or being Macedonian or caring for Macedonia!

(21) Kostur fighters - On March 5, 1943 the first armed military unit was formed in Kostur, consisting of fighters from Greek occupied Macedonia. They quickly appeared in 54 villages and their numbers swelled to 9850 armed men. They called themselves fighters, defenders against the armed Greek nationalist gangs. In western Macedonia in 1943, these armed nationalist Greek gangs were responsible for intimidating the Macedonian people by spreading anti-Macedonian propaganda in the form of leaflets and by other means. On October 20, 1943 the CPG formed the organization SNOF (Slavo-Macedonian National Liberation Front) in order to disarm and destroy these Kostur fighters. After the Kostur fighters were disarmed and disbanded, in April 1944, the CPG also disbanded SNOF, its military units and incorporated the Macedonians fighters into ELAS. At that point some Macedonians fighters refused to be incorporated into ELAS and fled across the Yugoslav border and joined the partisan units in Vardar Macedonia as part of Tito’s army.

(22) General Markos Vafiadis was a communist, a tobacco worker and a member of the CPG since 1928. He was a member of the CPG Central Committee since 1942. Second CPG Secretary of Domestic Affairs in Greek occupied Macedonia. Divisional Commissar of ELAS in Greek occupied Macedonia. Later he was military commander and head of the Provisional Democratic Government of Greece during the Greek Civil War. In the CPG Political Bureau Resolution of September 15, 1948, it was said that “Markos Vafiadis, as Commissar of a Group of ELAS divisions in Macedonia, followed a chauvinistic policy towards the Slavo-Macedonian fighters. (“Neos Kosmos” August 1950. “Ten years of struggle”, p. 470).

(23) At the June 4, 1956 meeting of the Presidency of the “Ilinden” organization belonging to the Macedonians from Greek occupied Macedonia, created on Zahariadis’s initiative, Colonel Pando Vaina, head of the organization, in delivering his paper about the persecution of Macedonians by the CPG, among other things, said: “… During the period when DAG was fighting and after its defeat, Zahariadis implemented a policy of vilifying and persecuting a good part of the Slavo-Macedonian cadres and popular fighters. Although the charges were completely unfounded, it was very easy for Zahariadis to label the Slavo-Macedonian cadres and popular fighters “enemy agent” etc. Based on these false accusations in 1948-1949 and later, more Slavo-Macedonians were arrested and some were liquidated...” (Am F-21/1600).

(24) On February 21, 1947 the British government informed the U.S. government that, due to economic difficulties, as of March 31st, 1947 it would stop providing aid to Greece. The U.S. government considered its options and decided that if it did not assume Britain’s obligations towards the Greek Kingdom, it would face greater consequences in the future. To avoid that, U.S. President Truman announced his doctrine to award Greece 300 million dollars of aid in order to protect the Athenian regime.

(25) The so called “Varkiza Agreement” was signed on February 12, 1943 at Varkiza, a resort located near Athens. The Agreement was between the Resistance Movement leadership consisting of the CPG and EAM on one side and the Plastiras Government, and the British General Scobey on the other. Based on this Agreement EAM and ELAS (the number of ELAS fighters in Greece at the time was estimated to be around 70,000), as of July 16, 1943, were to be headed by Colonel Eddie Myers from the British Military Mission. By this Agreement, ELAS fell under the command of the British Middle East. By this Agreement the left practically handed power over to the right and it was literally over for ELAS.

(26) The Yalta Conference lasted from February 4th to the 11th, 1945. It was attended by Churchill, Stalin and Roosevelt, in the presence of their foreign ministers.

(26a) The British government had engaged a number of forces: In Solun there was a concentration of about 80,000 personnel and a large number of motor vehicles, tanks and cannons. At the Seres Airport (about 12 km from Solun) it had about 200 British fighter aircraft and 60 bombers.

(27) Most of the information on events under the heading “the hell of war”, was obtained from the following official archives and books;

-ΤΟ ΚΚΕ, ΕΠΙΣΗΜΑ ΚΕΙΜΕΝΑ, (1945-1949), ΣΥΓΗΡΟΝΗ ΕΠΟΧΗ, ΑΘΗΝΑ, 1987;

-∆ΗΜΟΚΡΑΤΙΚΟΣ ΣΤΡΑΤΟΣ, ΕΚ∆ΟΣΗ, ΡΙΖΟΣΠΑΣΤΗΣ, ΤΟΜΟΣ Α, Β, ΑΘΗΝΑ 1996;