tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/macedonia-23810/articlesMacedonia – The Conversation2020-10-21T12:21:21Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1433222020-10-21T12:21:21Z2020-10-21T12:21:21ZFrom Macedonia to America: Civics lessons from the former Yugoslavia<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/360052/original/file-20200925-20-m2pkyr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=129%2C172%2C4591%2C2910&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Police officers push back demonstrators next to St. John's Episcopal Church outside of the White House, June 1, 2020 in Washington D.C.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/police-officers-wearing-riot-gear-push-back-demonstrators-news-photo/1216832807?adppopup=true">Jose Luis Magana/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/oct/08/portland-protests-medics-police">Americans protesting police violence</a> may find inspiration in the activism of Macedonian citizens in the <a href="https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/07/yugoslav-socialism-tito-self-management-serbia-balkans">last years of Communist rule in Yugoslavia</a>. </p>
<p>In August 1987, Communist party leaders imposed, without local input, a major infrastructure project on the village of Vevcani: to redirect water from its springs to other settlements. The villagers saw the lack of consultation as a betrayal. They also viewed the loss of control over water resources as a threat to their children’s futures. </p>
<p>So they resorted to civil disobedience. They blocked village streets with makeshift barricades and their bodies. They held up pictures of Tito, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Josip-Broz-Tito">the Yugoslav leader</a> who had died seven years earlier, to signal their loyalty to the country’s ideals. Their fight was against the abuse of state power.</p>
<p>The authorities responded by deploying the militia. They used physical force, including stun batons, to disperse the peaceful demonstrations. Participants, mostly women and children, were physically injured or psychologically traumatized. </p>
<p>As a <a href="https://isearch.asu.edu/profile/3172586">professor of global studies</a>, I have been <a href="https://vimeo.com/311996116">researching the last days of Yugoslavia</a>, before the country came apart in the ethnic violence of the early 1990s. </p>
<p>I’ve found that the 1987 “Vevcani affair” was the spark for a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/06/world/macedonia-tolerates-a-republic-in-its-midst.html">creative campaign of nonviolence</a> that catalyzed opposition countrywide to the Communist regime across Yugoslavia. </p>
<p>And this summer I also found that Vevcani holds what I believe to be an important lesson for Americans <a href="https://www.ipsos.com/en-us/news-polls/reuters-ipsos-data-police-reform-george-floyd-2020-06-12">peacefully protesting for police reform</a> and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/national/wp/2018/04/06/feature/in-reaction-to-trump-millions-of-americans-are-joining-protests-and-getting-political/">government accountability</a>. </p>
<h2>From Macedonia to Lafayette Square</h2>
<p>In early June, just before President Donald Trump walked from the White House to St. John’s Church for a photo op, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/forceful-removal-of-protesters-from-outside-white-house-spurs-debate-11591125435">U.S. Park Police used chemical irritants</a> and rubber bullets to <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/06/01/867532070/trumps-unannounced-church-visit-angers-church-officials">disperse peaceful protesters in Lafayette Square</a>.</p>
<p>Watching this footage and hearing testimony from <a href="https://naturalresources.house.gov/hearings/hybrid-full-committee-oversight-hearing_june-29-2020">people targeted by the police</a>, I was transported to Vevcani and the few images that exist depicting the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYgKRR6zSVQ">militia assaults</a>.</p>
<p>I found that <a href="https://dotsub.com/view/56d64421-8e34-42e5-80fd-75293e8a6f81">the villagers’ descriptions of chokeholds, electric shocks and unwarranted detention</a> had new and troubling resonance, as the Trump administration has <a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/07/trump-cbp-units-border-portland-moms-attacked.html">deployed paramilitary units</a> to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-race-protests-agents/u-s-homeland-security-confirms-three-units-sent-paramilitary-officers-to-portland-idUSKCN24M2RL">quash protests not only in Lafayette Square but in cities across the United States</a>.</p>
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<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Photograph of militiamen in Vevcani in August 1987, taken by anonymous activist.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">From the collection of Anastas Kjushkoski</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When asked who gave the order to use force in Lafayette Square, White House Press Secretary <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/06/05/barr-says-he-didnt-give-tactical-order-to-clear-protesters-304323">Kayleigh McEnany pointed to Attorney General William Barr</a>. Barr denied this, indicating that a <a href="https://apnews.com/1a993a6e99b4ecd1062a7552efed2d96">law enforcement officer made the “tactical” decision</a>. In congressional testimony in early July, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper stated that it was <a href="https://www.voanews.com/usa/us-military-leaders-still-unclear-who-ordered-dc-protesters-removed">“still unclear” who gave the order.</a></p>
<p>Witnessing the Trump administration’s obfuscation and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/officials-challenge-trump-administration-claim-of-what-drove-aggressive-expulsion-of-lafayette-square-protesters/2020/06/14/f2177e1e-acd4-11ea-a9d9-a81c1a491c52_story.html">shifting of the blame</a> invites parallels with the <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/culture/personal-history/my-mother-and-the-failed-experiment-of-yugoslavia">last gasp of the Yugoslav regime</a>. Faced with citizen anger, the ruling party spewed misinformation to sow doubt about the protesters’ character and motives.</p>
<p>The party retaliated against village leaders, blocking access to educational or employment opportunities for them and their families. The regime deployed all its state machinery to show strength and break the will of the movement.</p>
<p>It didn’t work. </p>
<h2>Growth of a mass movement</h2>
<p>Vevcani villagers defied further efforts to silence them. They pursued a campaign of creative, nonviolent protest to build a coalition of allies across Yugoslavia. </p>
<p>They enlisted artists, poets and journalists to their cause.</p>
<p>Theater director Vladimir Milcin, for example, published a powerful critique of Macedonian intellectuals’ complicity with the regime and helped Vevcani’s <a href="http://www.kuddrimkol.mk/teatar_istorijat.php?lang=en">amateur theater troupe</a> reach broader audiences. </p>
<p>Slovenian poet Dane Zaec spoke out against government-sponsored violence. And Montenegrin filmmaker Krsto Skanata told Vevcani’s story in his award-winning short film, “Thank you for Freedom.”</p>
<p>The villagers’ commitment to nonviolence and civility, and to the presentation of firsthand, eye-witness testimony of government brutality, contrasted sharply with the regime’s bullying tactics of bluster and denial. </p>
<p>By persistently asking party leaders a simple, direct question – who gave the order to use violence? – the villagers confronted authoritarianism. They called out those they judged responsible, listing their names on a mock gravestone in the village square.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363008/original/file-20201012-15-w10xzx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363008/original/file-20201012-15-w10xzx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363008/original/file-20201012-15-w10xzx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=444&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363008/original/file-20201012-15-w10xzx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=444&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363008/original/file-20201012-15-w10xzx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=444&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363008/original/file-20201012-15-w10xzx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=558&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363008/original/file-20201012-15-w10xzx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=558&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363008/original/file-20201012-15-w10xzx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=558&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Vevcani village square anti-monument, which lists the names of party officials that activists held responsible for the use of force against peaceful protesters in August 1987.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Keith Brown</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Their solidarity was fully displayed in May 1989. Vevcani’s leaders organized a mass march from the village to the central party headquarters in Skopje, over 100 miles away. More than 2,000 people assembled to demand a face-to-face meeting with the party leadership and a full inquiry into the infrastructure project. </p>
<p>By this time, a number of influential, reform-minded journalists and politicians in Macedonia had embraced the villagers’ cause.</p>
<p>Within a month, following a parliamentary debate and broad media coverage, the government’s interior minister and his deputy were forced to resign. By the end of 1989, the party had committed to reform, including a secret ballot to elect a new party head. An economist, Petar Gosev, won and led the reformers to <a href="https://balkaninsight.com/2011/04/28/past-election-results-in-macedonia/">introduce multiparty elections in 1990</a>. </p>
<p>The persistence and moral clarity of Vevcani’s mobilization kick-started the political transition from authoritarianism to pluralism. Thirty years on, <a href="https://www.ndi.org/central-and-eastern-europe/north-macedonia">international organizations identify government accountability</a> as a top priority for citizens in the Republic of North Macedonia. </p>
<h2>Sabotaging the rule of law</h2>
<p>Their story offers a broader lesson for the United States. </p>
<p>[<em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>For defenders of democracy, it is a reminder of the power of simple, direct questions to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/09/18/united-states-is-backsliding-into-autocracy-under-trump-scholars-warn/">expose authoritarianism</a>.</p>
<p>When governments deploy violence against peaceful protesters in the name of law and order, they are the ones <a href="https://www.lawfareblog.com/repairing-rule-law-agenda-post-trump-reform">sabotaging the rule of law</a>. </p>
<p>And to those tempted to abandon core democratic principles and resort to brute physical force, the Vevcani affair might serve as reminder of what happens to those, like the hardliners of Communist Yugoslavia, who find themselves on the wrong side of history.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/143322/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Keith Brown's research in the Republic of Macedonia (now the Republic of North Macedonia) was supported by the National Council for Eurasian and East European Research and the Fulbright Program.</span></em></p>Demonstrations by Macedonian villagers in the 1980s, which helped spark the end of Communist rule in the former Yugoslavia, hold vital lessons for Americans peacefully protesting for police reform.Keith Brown, Professor of Politics and Global Studies, Arizona State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1076632018-11-29T13:47:42Z2018-11-29T13:47:42ZHungary is making a rare exception to its draconian asylum laws – for the disgraced former prime minister of Macedonia<p>Nikola Gruevski, the former prime minister of Macedonia has announced that he has been granted asylum in Hungary in a case that has caused some surprise in both nations. Gruevski was due to start a two year jail term after being <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/nov/20/anti-asylum-orban-makes-exception-for-a-friend-in-need">sentenced</a> for corruption in Macedonia but will avoid that fate after seeking shelter from his political ally, Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban.</p>
<p>For his part, Orban seems to have made a rare exception to his hardline stance on asylum for his friend. Their alliance is perhaps not surprising. Orban is the face of “illiberal democracy” in Europe and Gruevski has been a main ideological ally in Macedonia. Gruevski has built fences to stop migration. Hungary has stationed 50 policemen at the Macedonian-Greek border to help keep out migrants. And, under Orban, Hungary has become the <a href="http://www.kormany.hu/hu/kulgazdasagi-es-kulugyminiszterium/gazdasagdiplomaciaert-felelos-allamtitkar/hirek/a-magyar-macedon-gazdasagi-kapcsolatok-perspektivikusan-alakulnak">fifth largest investor</a> in Macedonia.</p>
<p>Just like Orban, Gruevski has also clashed with Brussels over his approach to <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/neighbourhood-enlargement/sites/near/files/pdf/key_documents/2016/20161109_report_the_former_yugoslav_republic_of_macedonia.pdf">democracy</a> – a key issue if Macedonia were to join the European Union. The nation has been a candidate for accession to the union since 2005.</p>
<p>It’s still puzzling why Orban would contradict his own strict migration policies and take a request for asylum from Gruevski. It seems a convicted criminal deserves a hearing where refugees fleeing war in Syria do not.</p>
<p>Gruevski asked for asylum at the Hungarian embassy in Tirana and then appears to have travelled from Albania through Montenegro and Serbia into Hungary. Gruevski <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/ex-macedonian-prime-minister-nikola-gruevski-asks-for-political-asylum-in-hungary/">said</a> his life was threatened in Macedonia and a member of Orban’s Fidesz party <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/nov/15/nikola-gruevski-macedonia-fugitive-former-pm-seeks-asylum-hungary">claimed</a> he faced political persecution there. </p>
<p>The Albanian government quickly accused Hungary of collecting Gruevski in a diplomatic car and taking him away illegally. The Hungarian government initially denied involvement but went on to <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/hungarian-intelligence-facilitated-escape-of-former-macedonian-leader-nikola-gruevski/">admit</a> that Hungarian diplomats did help him escape. The Macedonian government has requested he be extradited.</p>
<h2>Who gets asylum in Hungary?</h2>
<p>Aside from the diplomatic intrigue, the case raises interesting inconsistencies in how Hungary applies its <a href="https://theconversation.com/hungary-sanctions-dont-expect-viktor-orban-to-back-down-after-parliament-vote-103128">draconian migration laws</a>. The law there states that asylum seekers must be placed in so-called <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=23879&LangID=E">“transit zones”</a> – essentially detention centres – while their asylum applications are assessed. However, while this rule is strictly applied to refugees arriving from Syria and Africa, Gruevski was not placed in a transit zone.</p>
<p>The Hungarian government has claimed security reasons were behind the decision to fast track Gruevski’s asylum application. But the law provides for <a href="https://24.hu/kulfold/2018/11/19/nikola-gruevszki-helsinki-bizottsag-orban-balazs/">no exception</a> whatsoever in this regard, unless the applicant is an unaccompanied minor, a pregnant woman or an individual suffering from serious vulnerabilities.</p>
<p>Hungary also does not recognise asylum applications made by arrivals who travelled through Serbia to get to their final destination. Serbia is a safe country and their asylum claims should therefore be made there, the government contends. In other cases, Hungary’s refusal to take applications of this kind has raised serious concerns regarding both international and EU asylum law. The issue has been referred to the <a href="https://magyarnarancs.hu/belpol/kontenerek-es-paragrafusok-113413/?orderdir=novekvo">Court of Justice of the European Union</a>. Yet Hungary is happy to wave its stance for Gruevski. </p>
<p>Nor does Gruevski qualify as a political refugee under international law. According to <a href="https://index.hu/kulfold/2018/11/21/ha_en_lettem_volna_a_biro_orizetben_tartottam_volna_gruevszkit/?fbclid=IwAR0LCbMNbttJ6ZMkQimi8HiAMEfrqljumwgcsuNICSw0cwzkn1L6XYpussU">Uranija Pirovska</a>, director of the Macedonian Helsinki Committee, an NGO monitoring rule of law and human rights violations in the country, Gruevski’s conviction in Macedonia was in line with all national and international laws. This should mean he cannot be granted asylum to avoid punishment.</p>
<p>What’s more, Hungarian officials could have broken their own national laws if they helped Gruevski. A very recent amendment to the Hungarian criminal code makes it illegal to provide assistance to asylum seekers who are not persecuted in their home country or transit countries.</p>
<p>Despite all this, the government still hasn’t clarified the legal basis of Gruevski’s entry into Hungary. Orban has, in the past, <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/viktor-orban-migrants-are-a-poison-hungarian-prime-minister-europe-refugee-crisis/">said</a> that every single migrant poses a public security and terror risk to Hungary. So why was a migration regime designed supposedly to keep “criminals” out of EU been undermined to smuggle a criminal into the EU?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/107663/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Umut Korkut receives funding from European Commission funded Horizon 2020 project RESPOND: Multilevel Governance of Mass Migration in Europe and Beyond (2017-2020). </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Daniel Gyollai receives funding from European Commission funded Horizon 2020 project RESPOND: Multilevel Governance of Mass Migration in Europe and Beyond (2017-2020).</span></em></p>Viktor Orban is extremely opposed to taking asylum applications, unless they come from his friends.Umut Korkut, Chair professor, Glasgow Caledonian UniversityDaniel Gyollai, PhD candidate, School for Business and Society, Glasgow Caledonian UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/998702018-07-12T15:18:07Z2018-07-12T15:18:07ZDonald Trump, Russia and money: what we learned from this year’s NATO Summit<p>After days of diplomatic confusion, the 2018 NATO summit has drawn to a close. As representatives from the alliance’s 29 member states return to their respective countries – or, in the case of US president Donald Trump, travel on to meet his Russian and British counterparts – the participants will all be trying to make sense of what happened.</p>
<p>Trump’s contributions to international events are often gauche in the extreme, and this summit was no exception. His visit was accompanied by <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_wvmaCsz1I">awkward handshakes</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1017025845905494016">off-topic Twitter posts</a> and <a href="https://qz.com/1325858/nato-summit-2018-a-photo-of-trump-and-world-leaders-that-is-too-obvious/">oddly symbolic photos</a>. Belligerent comments are also par for the course; within moments of arriving at his first breakfast meeting, Trump <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=37&v=HjVxXhCe7gA">decried</a> the Nord Stream 2 energy infrastructure project as “very inappropriate” while NATO secretary general Jens Stoltenberg looked on in horror. He went on to state that Germany was a “captive of Russia” before indicating, once again, that Europe’s largest economy contributed too little to NATO coffers.</p>
<p>The €9.5 billion Nord Stream 2 installation will see Germany connected directly to Russia through a 1,200km gas pipeline. The project has been dogged by controversy, with NATO member states <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/may/22/boris-johnson-joins-us-criticising-russia-germany-gas-pipeline-nord-stream-2">repeatedly questioning</a> the implications for European energy security as relations with Russia worsen. The conspicuous appointment of former German chancellor Gerhard Schröder, personal friend of Russian president Vladimir Putin, as chairman of the pipeline’s operator, Nord Stream AG, and independent director of the Russian energy giant Rosneft has stoked the view that Russia has captured a permissive Germany’s energy supply.</p>
<p>It’s certainly true that Germany relies on Russian gas imports, but gas makes up <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-44794688">only 20%</a> of Germany’s energy mix. Germany is also <a href="https://euobserver.com/energy/141570">increasingly tying</a> completion of the Nord Stream 2 project to Ukraine and Poland’s economic security – given some existing pipelines pass through their territory – although Eastern European states <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/42e31c82-3cc4-11e8-b9f9-de94fa33a81e">are sceptical</a> of Germany’s reassurances on this front. </p>
<p>Trump’s <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/86fe69d0-85a3-11e8-a29d-73e3d454535d">repeated</a> comments certainly go beyond the concerns raised by others. They are also simplistic and crude – and based on Angela Merkel’s <a href="https://www.thelocal.de/20180711/germany-is-captive-of-russia-says-trump-at-nato-summit">cool reaction</a>, it looks like they missed their mark.</p>
<h2>From budgets to burden-sharing</h2>
<p>Trump is consistently inconsistent. On day one of the summit he threatened to pull the US out of NATO over the diminutive defence expenditure of other alliance members. On day two he stated that the United States’ commitment to the alliance remains <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/12/world/europe/trump-nato-summit-uk.html">“very strong”</a>.</p>
<p>Burden-sharing has been a key focus of NATO summits for years. It’s also long been a bugbear for the US, which spends more on defence both as a percentage of GDP and in absolute terms than any other member. At the 2014 Wales summit, <a href="https://www.nato.int/cps/ic/natohq/official_texts_112964.htm">NATO members pledged</a> to raise defence expenditure to 2% of GDP by 2024, while also committing 20% of national defence expenditure to equipment procurement. But only <a href="https://www.nato.int/nato_static_fl2014/assets/pdf/pdf_2018_03/20180315_180315-pr2018-16-en.pdf">five states</a> have reached that level today. While some members are on track, many (including Germany) are unlikely to reach the target by 2024. </p>
<p>Trump somewhat surprisingly demanded the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jul/11/donald-trump-tells-nato-allies-to-spend-4-of-gdp-on-defence">2% target be raised to 4%</a>, although this was not reflected in the eventual summit declaration. Nonetheless, the 2018 summit has refocused attention on the 2% benchmark, highlighting how it distracts from the broader contribution member states make to NATO. While Greece hits the 2% target (and steers clear of Trump’s attacks in the process) it contributes little to NATO operations. Conversely, Germany provides the second largest number of troops for NATO operations even though it spends only 1.2% of GDP on defence. </p>
<p>Under NATO’s Article 3, member states commit to “maintain and develop their individual and collective capacity to resist armed attack” – but it’s clear that many European NATO members lack this capacity today. While questions about burden-sharing are therefore partially justified, it’s counterproductive to fixate on the 2% target without discussing the outputs of NATO expenditure.</p>
<h2>Trouble to the east</h2>
<p>In one of the more positive moments of the summit, the newly christened Republic of North Macedonia (which has been renamed following the conclusion of a long-standing dispute with Greece) <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nato-summit-declaration/nato-formally-invites-macedonia-to-join-alliance-idUSKBN1K12AR">was invited to join NATO</a>. This was received gladly in Brussels, although Macedonia still has a number of hurdles to clear before membership is finalised. Its citizens are yet to approve the country’s new name, on which membership hinges, which they will do via a politically loaded referendum.</p>
<p>NATO’s demand-driven eastward expansion into states of the former Soviet Union has generated controversy itself. Russia is far from happy to see a US-led military alliance encroaching on its border. The 2018 summit saw little movement on the thorny issue of Georgian membership, and when it comes to Macedonia’s new name, Russia has so far refused to endorse the agreement for fear that this relatively tiny country could become a NATO member. Georgia and Bosnia and Herzegovina are other contentious NATO members-in-waiting, and despite their long history in Russia’s orbit, both have contributed to NATO-led operations.</p>
<p>Overall, one thing is clear: this was a NATO summit like no other. And despite Jens Stoltenberg’s continued positive attitude, Trump’s bluntness has exposed fault lines throughout the alliance. How members will respond in the long term is anyone’s guess.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/99870/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Armida L. M. van Rij is affiliated with Women in International Security (WIIS) UK. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert J Downes does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>From awkwardness and confusion to rancour, Trump certainly left his mark on the 2018 NATO summit.Robert J Downes, Researcher in Security and Defence, the Policy Institute at King's, King's College LondonArmida v., Researcher in Security and Defence Policy at the Policy Institute at King's, King's College LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/946752018-04-19T05:45:09Z2018-04-19T05:45:09ZGreece’s Macedonian Slavic heritage was wiped out by linguistic oppression – here’s how<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/215421/original/file-20180418-163966-z1yigh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Macedonian Slavic wedding in the Prespes region in the border between Greece and FYR Macedonia.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Culture_of_Prespes#/media/File:Wedding_in_Papli,_Prespes.jpg">Unknown via Wikimedia Commons</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>If you’ve ever been to a traditional Greek celebration, you will have seen people joining hands and dancing in a circle following the same steps to the accompaniment of live music. You will also have heard songs sung in Greek as most traditional tunes go hand in hand with lyrics talking about love, emigration and rural life.</p>
<p>In the northernmost parts of the Greek regions of <a href="https://goo.gl/maps/DZSkxBr5Qg12">Western</a> and <a href="https://goo.gl/maps/ah8REu7m7Dk">Central Macedonia</a>, however, all the folk dances are instrumental tunes. Lyrics have been replaced by loud, brass and woodwind instruments like the cornet, the trombone and the clarinet. This is not some peculiar aspect of the local musical heritage. Traditional tunes in these regions had their own words – but they were in a language that the Greek state has tried to wipe out for nearly a century: <a href="https://www.ethnologue.com/language/mkd">Macedonian Slavic</a>.</p>
<p>After emerging victorious from two <a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-Balkan-Wars-1912-1913-Prelude-to-the-First-World-War/Hall/p/book/9780415229470">Balkan Wars</a> in 1912 and 1913, Greece’s territory and population <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Balkan_Wars_Boundaries.jpg#/media/File:Balkan_Wars_Boundaries.jpg">expanded dramatically</a> by the addition of the lion’s share of the historic geographical region of Macedonia, the part found on the southern side of the Voras/Nidže and Belles/Belasica mountain ranges.</p>
<p>As is often the case in history, state borders did not coincide with linguistic ones. The so-called “New Lands” were a diverse mosaic of different linguistic groups, including <a href="https://search.proquest.com/docview/195175246/fulltextPDF/A1CAF7A739514F7BPQ/1?accountid=14987">260,000 people</a> who spoke varieties of a south Slavic language they called <em>tukasni</em> “local”, <a href="http://lacito.vjf.cnrs.fr/vient-de-paraitre/adamou_nashta.htm"><em>nashta</em> “ours”</a> or <em>makedonski</em> “Macedonian”. </p>
<p>These varieties, including the standardised version that is today the official language of FYR Macedonia, have similarities with Bulgarian – and <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1354-5078.1998.00389.x/full">many people in Bulgaria</a> view them as Bulgarian dialects. But sociolinguistics has shown that what counts as a language in its own right and what is seen as a dialect of a language are essentially decided by <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/01/difference-between-language-dialect/424704/">political rather than linguistic criteria</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/215423/original/file-20180418-134691-1u4m8j0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/215423/original/file-20180418-134691-1u4m8j0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/215423/original/file-20180418-134691-1u4m8j0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=621&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/215423/original/file-20180418-134691-1u4m8j0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=621&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/215423/original/file-20180418-134691-1u4m8j0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=621&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/215423/original/file-20180418-134691-1u4m8j0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=781&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/215423/original/file-20180418-134691-1u4m8j0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=781&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/215423/original/file-20180418-134691-1u4m8j0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=781&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ethnographic map of Macedonia, 1914.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://legacy.lib.utexas.edu/maps/historical/balkan_serbs_1914.jpg">Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1914.</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>From an invisible language…</h2>
<p>For the Greek government, having people speaking Macedonian Slavic in its territory did not sit well with its national ideology. Signs of discomfort towards Greece’s new multilingual reality showed very early on. In 1920, the Greek statistical authority ran the first census after the country’s territorial expansion. A language question was asked but the data for the Macedonia division were never published. The <a href="http://dlib.statistics.gr/Book/GRESYE_02_0101_00011.pdf">language data for the Thessaly division</a>, however, record speakers of Macedonian Slavic, probably reported by seasonal workers from Macedonia who were in Thessaly at the time of the census. Greek authorities acknowledged the presence of Macedonian Slavic as a legitimate language but made a conscious effort to conceal the number of people who spoke it.</p>
<p>In the north of the country, authorities launched a massive Hellenising mission. Overnight, Madeconian Slavic names of people, <a href="http://pandektis.ekt.gr/pandektis/handle/10442/4968">places</a> and <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/291318721_Singing_without_words_Language_and_identity_shift_among_Slavic_Macedonian_musicians_in_Greece">dances</a> were rendered into Greek by public servants. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/iXCWKIubGcs?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>My own paternal grandfather’s family name became Karatsareas from Karachorov. My maternal grandfather’s one became Kantzouris from Kanzurov. The area of Karadzova was renamed Almopia with its main town of Subotsko becoming Aridaia. The dance Puscheno was called Leventikos or Lytos. The aim was to leave no visible trace of Macedonian Slavic in public records.</p>
<h2>…to a forbidden one</h2>
<p>In the 1930s and in a climate of <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Xoww453NVQMC&lpg=PR3&hl=de&pg=PR3#v=onepage&q&f=false">competing nationalisms in the southern Balkans</a>, the similarities between Macedonian Slavic and the languages of the then Kingdom of Yugoslavia and Kingdom of Bulgaria began to raise suspicions among Greek authorities about the national allegiance and “consciousness” of Macedonian Slavic speakers. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/who-gets-to-use-the-name-macedonia-a-decades-old-row-still-to-be-resolved-90708">Who gets to use the name 'Macedonia'? A decades-old row still to be resolved</a>
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</p>
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<p>In August 1931, Greek journalist and subsequent politician Periklis Iliadis called in his newspaper column for a ban on greeting in “Bulgarian” and publicly singing songs in languages other than Greek – two proposals that <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/714005461">Ioannis Metaxas’s fascist regime</a> promptly adopted. </p>
<p>In 1936, the governor-general of Macedonia issued order of prohibition 122770: “On the restoration of the uniform language”, banning the use of Macedonian Slavic in both public and private. People caught speaking Macedonian Slavic – sometimes by police officers eavesdropping through people’s windows – were dragged to military police stations where they were beaten and sometimes tortured. Those who had the money were fined. Teachers beat pupils who spoke Macedonian Slavic in class or in the playground – even when that was the only language they were able to speak. This happened to my maternal grandmother.</p>
<h2>A muted heritage</h2>
<p>In 1994, <a href="https://www.hrw.org/report/1994/04/01/denying-ethnic-identity/macedonians-greece">Human Rights Watch</a> called for Greece to end harassment of Macedonian Slavic speakers. In 1998, the <a href="http://www.icnl.org/research/journal/vol1iss1/cn_1.htm">European Court of Human Rights</a> ruled that Greece violated the right of its citizens to form associations by refusing them permission to establish a Macedonian Slavic cultural association. But these calls came much too late.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/214789/original/file-20180413-566-oe36es.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/214789/original/file-20180413-566-oe36es.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=531&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/214789/original/file-20180413-566-oe36es.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=531&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/214789/original/file-20180413-566-oe36es.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=531&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/214789/original/file-20180413-566-oe36es.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=667&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/214789/original/file-20180413-566-oe36es.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=667&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/214789/original/file-20180413-566-oe36es.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=667&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A guesthouse in Loutraki (Aridaia, northern Greece) bearing the Slavic name of the village, Pozhar. The letter Ž has been borrowed from the Latinic version of the Macedonian Slavic.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In the face of the aggressive and violent oppression they suffered in the 1930s, Macedonian Slavic speakers developed a deeply ingrained fear of speaking their language in front of people they did not know and trust. They stopped singing their songs, playing only the traditional tunes of their musical heritage. With time, they started using Greek more to refer to themselves and the places where they were born and live. </p>
<p>Today, only older people speak the language. For younger people, it is more of a passive knowledge – a kind of heritage that will die out with the older generation and the only thing that will remain to remind them of it will be a handful of words and tunes to which young musicians do not know the words.</p>
<h2>Banning minority languages</h2>
<p>This sort of linguistic oppression is far from unique. Similar stories have been reported by speakers of <a href="http://www.thejournal.ie/readme/bliain-na-gaeilge-my-mother-made-a-choice-to-speak-to-us-in-her-mother-tongue-3951221-Apr2018/">Irish in Ireland</a>, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-19076304">Scottish Gaelic in Scotland</a>, <a href="https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201011/cmhansrd/cm100609/debtext/100609-0011.htm">Welsh in Wales</a> (read Susan Elan Jones’s comments in Column 377), <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/spain/11893734/They-banned-us-speaking-Catalan.-Now-they-want-us-to-disappear.html">Catalan in Spain</a>, <a href="http://content.lib.washington.edu/aipnw/marr.html">Native American languages in the US</a> and <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-11-19/raja-australia-is-the-place-of-vanishing-languages/5101822">Aboriginal languages in Australia</a>. </p>
<p>It is sad that the efforts of state authorities to make speakers of minority languages assimilate to the majority language were for the most part successful. And alongside the languages, other expressions of culture are being lost, including place names, family names, songs, dances, games and traditions. Linguistic oppression and the consequences it has on speakers of minority languages and their cultural heritage have no place in a modern world where the <a href="http://www.un.org/en/events/culturaldiversityday/index.shtml">value of cultural diversity</a> is recognised.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/multilingualism-must-be-celebrated-as-a-resource-not-a-problem-90397">Multilingualism must be celebrated as a resource, not a problem</a>
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</em>
</p>
<hr>
<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/94675/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Petros Karatsareas receives funding from the British Academy and the Leverhulme Trust. </span></em></p>For the Greek government, having people speaking Macedonian Slavic in its territory did not sit well with its national ideology.Petros Karatsareas, Lecturer in English Language and Linguistics, University of WestminsterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/934082018-03-19T12:58:42Z2018-03-19T12:58:42ZBritain’s role in the Balkans – why Boris Johnson is about to turn pro-EU<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/210514/original/file-20180315-104676-drf5g0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption"></span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Neil Hall</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Here’s a paradox from Brexit Britain. This summer, at a summit meeting in London organised by the UK’s Foreign Office, a hard Brexiteer – the foreign secretary Boris Johnson – will be the designated advocate of EU membership for the Western Balkan states. A country preparing to leave the EU will preach the accession of <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/bosnia-10925">Bosnia-Herzegovina</a>, Albania, FYR Macedonia, Serbia, Kosovo, and Montenegro to the European Union. A country seeking to “take back control” from the heavy-handedness of Brussels will advise others to relinquish their sovereignty to that same superstate. What’s going on here?</p>
<p>The London summit in July will host the leaders of the six Western Balkan states and those of Britain, Germany, Italy, France and Austria. It’s part of the so-called <a href="https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=berlin+process+balkans&oq=berlin+process+balkans&aqs=chrome..69i57.4952j1j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8">Berlin Process</a>, an intergovernmental initiative introduced by Angela Merkel in 2014 whose goal was to help the development of the Western Balkans by focusing on investment, connectivity, infrastructure and regional cooperation, with the ultimate aim of their <a href="https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-eu-balkans/eu-opens-door-to-balkans-with-2025-target-for-membership-idUKKBN1FQ1X4">joining the EU</a>.</p>
<p>So far, as part of the process, a <a href="http://www.rycowb.org/">Regional Youth Cooperation Office</a> has been established to “promote the spirit of reconciliation and cooperation between the youth in the region through youth exchange programmes”. An <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/neighbourhood-enlargement/sites/near/files/pdf/policy-highlights/regional-cooperation/20150828_chairmans_conclusions_western_balkans_summit.pdf">agreement</a> has also been signed for the settlement of bilateral disputes. There is also talk of a Western Balkans Economic Area, where goods, services, investments and skilled workers would be able to move without obstacles. </p>
<p>The Berlin Process includes, from the EU side, the five strongest and most prominent member states. Every summer, the leaders of these countries meet with the leaders from the six Western Balkan countries to reaffirm their commitment to the region’s European integration. They also aim to attract pledges for investment and take a family photo during a highly publicised summit.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/210512/original/file-20180315-104663-1u3ht26.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/210512/original/file-20180315-104663-1u3ht26.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/210512/original/file-20180315-104663-1u3ht26.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/210512/original/file-20180315-104663-1u3ht26.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/210512/original/file-20180315-104663-1u3ht26.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=507&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/210512/original/file-20180315-104663-1u3ht26.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=507&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/210512/original/file-20180315-104663-1u3ht26.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=507&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Delegates arrive at the 2017 summit in Trieste.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>Now, following a commitment made in 2014, it’s Britain’s turn to be the host of that summit. The 2018 meeting is an opportunity for the UK to show that it has something substantial to offer to European affairs despite Brexit. After all, every host so far has shaped the agenda by including their own expertise. In Vienna, three years ago it was civil society engagement, in Paris, two years ago, it was climate change. Last year’s summit in <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/transport/themes/international/news/2017-07-12-western-balkans-summit-2017-delivering-region_en">Trieste</a> dealt with the rule of law and the fight against corruption.</p>
<h2>Delicate balance</h2>
<p>Despite its imminent departure from the EU, Britain does still have a useful role to play in the Berlin Process. That might include its security expertise as a strong military nation that remains an enthusiastic member of <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/nato-786">NATO</a>. With geopolitics becoming increasingly significant for Europe’s foreign policy, the Western Balkans is one of the most vulnerable regions of the continent. From a security perspective, the region is highly exposed to risks on the periphery of Europe. </p>
<p>The security risks in the region include a generic fear of return to the wars of the 1990s among some post-Yugoslav states, the threat of <a href="https://theconversation.com/radicalisation-in-bosnia-old-wounds-reopened-by-an-emerging-problem-63534">Islamic fundamentalism</a>, the rise of organised crime, geopolitical and geo-economic competition from China, Russia, or Turkey.</p>
<p>Then there are the existing bilateral disputes among post-Yugoslav states. All have unresolved border issues – some of them subject to international arbitration. And all these disputes affect stability. None of the states have threatened to use military force against each other to resolve these issues, but any security assistance from abroad to one country may be seen to antagonise the interests of the neighbouring country.</p>
<p>Focusing so heavily on the issue of security can also actually harm political progress. People in the region increasingly experience a backsliding of democracy. </p>
<p>As a recent House of Lords <a href="https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201719/ldselect/ldintrel/53/53.pdf">report</a> noted, there is “serious concern that gains made towards good governance and the rule of law are in danger of being lost as countries in the region turn to authoritarian leadership, nationalistic politics and state capture”. And a recent <a href="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/balkan-countries-still-facing-old-human-rights-issues-01-18-2018">report</a> by Human Rights Watch found that most countries in the region still face serious challenges in upholding human rights standards.</p>
<p>Because the primary concern has, for so long, been security in the Western Balkans, such anxieties have, for the most part, fallen on deaf ears in Western capitals. Geopolitical concerns have allowed local leaders and governments to enjoy lax political conditionality for the sake of security and stability – what has been labelled “stabilitocracy”. As a result, liberal politics have deteriorated and advances made during the 2000s have eroded.</p>
<p>It’s important that any security agenda embraces democracy, human rights, and rule of law – the “holy trinity” of political transformation, which itself is a necessary condition for security and stability in the region. That should be the common goal of both the Berlin Process and the European Commission, the latter having recently adopted a <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/commission/sites/beta-political/files/communication-credible-enlargement-perspective-western-balkans_en.pdf">new enlargement strategy</a> for the Western Balkan candidate states. The biggest challenge for Johnson and the Foreign Office, on this particular occasion, is to find ways to cooperate effectively with the European Union, aiming at the inclusion of the Western Balkan countries in the European family, at a time when the UK is excluding itself from it.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/93408/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Adis Merdzanovic receives funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Othon Anastasakis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The foreign secretary will host a summit in London this summer on helping Balkan states join the EU.Othon Anastasakis, Program Director and Senior Research Fellow in South East European Studies, St Antony's College, University of OxfordAdis Merdzanovic, Postdoctoral Researcher, Junior Research Fellow, University of OxfordLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/907082018-01-30T16:03:05Z2018-01-30T16:03:05ZWho gets to use the name ‘Macedonia’? A decades-old row still to be resolved<p>In the latest volley of a long-running dispute on the right to the name “Macedonia”, an estimated 300,000 Macedonian Greeks rallied in Thessaloniki on January 21 against the use of the name by the country to their north, whose constitutional name is the Republic of Macedonia. A follow-up demonstration in Athens is planned for February 4. The sheer size of the crowds and the strength of feeling on display makes plain that the row is very much ongoing – and after <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Stillborn-Republic-Coalitions-Strategies-Mavrogordatos/dp/B01K92XDSY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1516814996&sr=8-1&keywords=stillborn+republic">decades</a> of <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Macedonia-Macedonians-History-Studies-Nationalities/dp/0817948813/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8">rancour</a>, it’s time to bring it to an end in sight. </p>
<p>Much of the naming dispute <a href="http://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=21483">comes down to history</a>. The Greeks arrived in the region in the 12th century BC, and the Hellenic cities forged ties with the <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/History-Macedonia-Historical-Geography-Prehistory/dp/0198142943/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1516813299&sr=8-3&keywords=hammond+macedonia">ancient Macedonian kingdom there</a> long before the Slavs arrived in the <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Macedonia-Macedonians-History-Studies-Nationalities/dp/0817948821/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1516813370&sr=1-1&keywords=rossos+macedonia">seventh century AD</a>. While Macedonia hosted many different cultures for centuries, its inhabitants considered themselves “Macedonians” – and since <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Balkans-since-1453-L-S-Stavrianos/dp/1850655510/ref=sr_1_4/258-4198663-4312348?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1516813092&sr=1-4&refinements=p_27%3AStavrianos">Ottoman times</a>, they have generally used that term for themselves regardless of language or national affiliation. At the heart of the argument is whether any one of the Balkans’ ethnic groups should monopolise Macedonia’s heritage or whether the name could be constructively shared by everyone in the region.</p>
<p>Today, <a href="http://www.ekathimerini.com/224977/article/ekathimerini/news/nimetz-term-macedonia-to-be-included-in-name-proposa">more than 100 countries recognise Greece’s northern neighbour as the Republic of Macedonia</a>, so until recently, its leaders had no incentive to compromise on the issue. But now they are intent on joining both the EU and NATO – and in both cases, Greece would have to consent as a member state. The prospect that the republic could join is much welcomed in the West as a way of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/13/macedonias-nato-hopes-rise-as-deal-with-greece-looks-feasible">limiting Russia’s influence</a>, so the impetus to resolve the dispute has at last been renewed.</p>
<p>International mediators have fumbled several opportunities to solve this problem. Their last best chance was before the financial calamity of 2008, when Greece had <a href="https://www.euractiv.com/section/enlargement/news/greek-fm-says-athens-is-not-under-pressure-to-resolve-the-name-dispute-with-skopje/">moderate leaders</a> willing to normalise the country’s foreign relations. Now, Greece is still struggling to recover from a decade-long financial crisis, and the government led by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras lacks the time and energy for peace initiatives.</p>
<p>And as the post-2008 Greek financial tragedy illustrates, latent crises have a way of resurfacing at the least amenable moments, and any solution, of course, is neither obvious nor simple. South-east Europe is rife with unresolved <a href="http://www.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.11126/stanford/9780804794084.001.0001/upso-9780804794084">foreign policy and minority issues</a>, and not since the wars of the 1990s has this region been more fragile. </p>
<p>Yet even in the endlessly fraught Balkans, a skillful enough politician can turn a crisis into an opportunity.</p>
<h2>Balance of power</h2>
<p>Alexis Tsipras rules Greece in coalition with the right-wing Independent Greeks, who are <a href="http://greece.greekreporter.com/2018/01/11/kammenos-says-anel-could-call-political-leaders-meeting-if-they-disagree-with-fyrom-name/">likely to oppose any sort of compromise</a> over the name “Macedonia”. But Tsipras is not as weak as some in the foreign media seem to think. A compromise will secure the solid support of his party, and at minimum, one of Greece’s <a href="http://www.kathimerini.gr/945187/article/epikairothta/politikh/8eodwrakhs-gia-skopiano-ektos-pragmatikothtas-onomasia-xwris-ton-oro-makedonia%22%22">more liberal parties</a>, therefore contributing to a constructive realignment in Greek politics. </p>
<p>And as a keen tactician, Tsipras will have an eye on both the tangible benefits of NATO enlargement and the ebb and flow of national sentiment – particularly in Greek Macedonia, where the issue is most strongly felt.</p>
<p>Macedonian Greeks overwhelmingly consider the ancient Macedonian heritage an integral part of their own culture, <a href="http://voria.gr/article/erevna-ochi-tis-vorias-elladas-sti-chrisi-tis-lexis-makedonia">and oppose any use of the name (</a> by the neighbouring republic. Greek Macedonia holds disproportionate sway over the government in Athens, and in recent decades the naming issue <a href="http://www.lse.ac.uk/europeanInstitute/research/hellenicObservatory/pdf/2nd_Symposium/Spyridon_Kotsovilis_paper.pdf">has even decided national elections</a>. The region is in fact larger in population and area than its sovereign neighbour to the north – yet it has no formal voice in the two countries’ negotiations. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt198930g">Unlike fellow EU members</a>, Greece is a highly centralised state. One could imagine new devolved structures in the future and a “Republic of Macedonia” within Greece itself, with its own parliament and local administration. But in the absence of devolved structures, Tsipras himself has to convince his electorate and Greek Macedonians that an agreement will secure their own use of the name and cultural heritage. There must be grassroots efforts to bring together municipal and civic leaders and investigate confidence-building measures, such as a common travel area in the Balkans. To safeguard local legitimacy, Tsipras should avoid <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/can-europe-make-it/alex-sakalis/greferendum">another risky national referendum</a> and seek instead a “double majority” approval in the Greek parliament, wherein a majority of Greek Macedonian MPs would have to back any decision. </p>
<h2>The other side</h2>
<p>Meanwhile, north of the border in the capital, Skopje, PM Zoran Zaev’s new moderate government is now confronting the nationalism of its predecessors, who used the past decade mostly to enrich themselves and construct replicas of ancient Macedonian monuments in Skopje. The <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/aug/14/alexander-great-macedonia-warrior-horse">giant bronze statue of Alexander the Great</a> erected in the centre of the city in 2011 was always going to lose the country friends and sympathy, but more importantly, it drove divisions and raised unrealistic expectations among the republic’s citizens.</p>
<p>UN lead negotiator Matthew Nimetz has suggested options using the Slavic pronunciation of the term – such as Republika Nova Makedonija and Republika Makedonija (Skopje) – but so far, these proposals seem unpalatable for both sides. A third more imaginative option would be to embrace a name that reflects the country’s recent achievements as a multi-ethnic society following the 2001 peace agreement with its Albanian minority.</p>
<p>The government in Skopje has taken on another challenge by committing to a referendum after reaching an agreement with Greece. As recent events in <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Mediating-Power-Sharing-Devolution-and-Consociationalism-in-Deeply-Divided/Cochrane-Loizides-Bodson/p/book/9780815370178">Cyprus, Colombia, and the UK</a> prove, referendums <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2016/10/03/politics/referendum-colombia-brexit-surprise/index.html">do not have the best record</a> of resolving complex problems. Yet to Zaev’s advantage, Albanian Macedonians, comprising about a quarter of the population, are likely either vote overwhelmingly in favour of the compromise or – depending on the framing of the question – abstain. Either would make it very difficult for those opposing the agreement to reach the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macedonian_autonomy_referendum,_2004">50% threshold required</a>. </p>
<p>Still, while Zaev <a href="http://www.novinite.com/articles/187435/Zoran+Zaev%3A+The+Referendum+About+the+Name+is+not+Anything+Tragic%2C+Frightnening+or+Impossible">described the referendum</a> as a guarantee to Greece that the agreement will be permanent, some parts of any agreement might also require a two-thirds approval in parliament, which his government cannot as yet command. </p>
<p>There are plenty of outside players who can help nudge the process forward, be they the EU with the prospect of full membership or the UN with its mediating role. But ultimately, this problem can only be solved if the leaders whose careers ride on the outcome can show the political and diplomatic skill required of them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/90708/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Neophytos Loizides does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A giant rally in Thessaloniki and another in Athens show the strength of feeling in Greek Macedonia – and all over a country’s name.Neophytos Loizides, Professor in International Conflict Analysis, University of KentLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/768752017-05-09T12:17:24Z2017-05-09T12:17:24ZTrouble in Macedonia as ethnic tensions run high<p>Macedonia may be a parliamentary democracy, but it’s also a fragile multicultural state. Its democracy has been in gradual decline since the mid-2000s – and in an era of unstable geopolitics and rising authoritarianism, the right sequence of events could send it slipping back into inter-ethnic strife.</p>
<p>The precarity of the country’s situation was made plain in April, when more than 200 protestors and loyalists to the Macedonian conservative-nationalist VMRO-DMPNE party <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-39738865">stormed the parliament building in Skopje</a>, and physically attacked lawmakers, who had earlier elected an ethnic Albanian politician, Talat Xhaferi, as speaker. The brawl left 77 people injured.</p>
<p>Events like these make it hard to remember that until relatively recently, the outlook for Macedonia was rather more hopeful. </p>
<p>After a <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/world/2001/review_of_2001/1703711.stm">brief conflict</a> between ethnic Macedonian and Albanian factions in 2001, the country had an incentive to join the European Union, and so managed to introduce tough reforms giving more local power to the Albanians. The European Council granted it EU candidate status at the end of 2005 – but in 2006, a backlash began in earnest. </p>
<p>That year, Nikola Gruevski and his VMRO-DPMNE party rode into power on a wave of resentment. Above all, their voters were furious at additional political rights for ethnic Albanians. Before and after he was elected, Gruevski duly played the nationalist card domestically and internationally like no Macedonian politician since the end of communism – not least with “Skopje 2014”, an expensive project that yielded numerous nationalist monuments <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2015/apr/11/skopje-macedonia-architecture-2014-project-building">widely ridiculed</a> for their aesthetic shortcomings.</p>
<p>Gruevski also <a href="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/macedonia-tapes-reveal-massive-party-employment">appointed cronies to public office</a>, <a href="http://www.novinite.com/articles/166574/Macedonia+Opposition+Leader+Unveils+%27Evidence%27+of+Gov%27t+Pressure+on+Judiciary">pressurised the judiciary</a>, and <a href="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/macedonia-s-gruevski-gives-threatening-speech-12-17-2016">intimidated</a> civil society groups forming against him. His grip on power was greatly challenged in 2015 when he was accused of having endorsed the illegal wiretapping of politicians, activists, and civil servants – among them Albanians.</p>
<p>While Gruevski’s VMRO-DPMNE won the most parliamentary seats in the <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-macedonia-election-result-idUSKBN1412L2">snap elections</a> of December 2016, it has no outright majority, and cannot form a working government. The opposition SDSM aspires to a coalition government with the ethnic Albanian Democratic Union for Integration (DUI), but Macedonia’s president, refuses to formally endorse any such government, as is legally necessary for it to take office.</p>
<p>To make things more complicated, this is all taking place in a region where the balance of power has shifted markedly away from democracy.</p>
<h2>Dangerous world</h2>
<p>Since the Macedonian-Albanian conflict of 2001, the EU has been trying to help turn Macedonia into a successful multicultural democracy with hopeful long-term prospects. The culmination of this project would be EU membership – but today, the prospects for western Balkan countries hoping to join are becoming more and more distant. </p>
<p>The EU as a whole is still grappling with <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-05-02/italy-is-europe-s-next-big-problem">financial instability</a>, a massive <a href="https://theconversation.com/more-pathways-for-migrants-to-europe-can-foil-people-smugglers-border-clampdowns-will-not-72250">refugee crisis</a>, the first ever <a href="https://theconversation.com/brexit-negotiations-what-does-europe-want-75263">departure of a member state</a>, and the rise of <a href="https://theconversation.com/no-this-isnt-the-1930s-but-yes-this-is-fascism-68867">right-wing populist movements</a> that directly challenge fundamental liberal European values. </p>
<p>The idea of Macedonia joining the EU is particularly unpopular with Greece, which vetoed further EU accession talks in 2009 because of the two countries’ long-running <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/16/macedonia-open-to-changing-its-name-to-end-24-year-dispute-with-greece">dispute over Macedonia’s name</a>. Gruevski’s distasteful Hellenic-style nationalist monuments are partially a response to this veto. </p>
<p>So for all that Western officials condemn the violence or political dysfunction in Macedonia, their statements ring rather hollow in the absence of progress on the EU issue. And while Europe struggles to leverage its influence, less democratic powers are filling the gap. </p>
<p>Russia’s relations with Western Europe are alarmingly tense, but it carries plenty of weight in the east. When the Bosnian Serb nationalist leader, Milorad Dodik, sought support for a controversial referendum on <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21707877-banned-vote-separate-bosnian-serb-national-day-has-some-people-talking-war-referendum">Republica Srpska’s on independence</a>, it was Russia he turned to. Moscow has extended its influence in <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-bulgaria-election-russia-idUSKBN13611H">Bulgaria</a>, a recent EU joiner, and increasingly authoritarian <a href="http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/04/12/hungary-most-vulnerable-in-central-europe-to-russian-influence-report-finds/">Hungary</a>.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/us-weary-of-turkey-s-neo-ottoman-ambitions-in-the-balkans/2027/5">Turkey</a>, meanwhile, is supporting the Balkans both economically and <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21688926-turkey-sponsoring-islam-abroad-extend-its-prestige-and-power-mosqued-objectives">religiously</a>, financing new mosques and providing religious guidance for Muslim populations – and most importantly, setting a bad example with its growing authoritarianism. </p>
<h2>High stakes</h2>
<p>Complicating the picture further is the influence of the Albanian state and diaspora. Albanians in the Balkans have long hoped to create a so-called “Albanian space” across borders where ethnic Albanians can interact via business, culture, tourism and so on. This project has been partially realised: Kosovars, for instance, enjoy visa-free travel to Albania, Macedonia and Montenegro, all of which have Albanian populations.</p>
<p>The apex of this project would be EU membership for the variously Albanian-populated countries in the Western Balkans. And if their stalled membership processes fail altogether, the consequences could be serious. </p>
<p>In April 2017 the Albanian prime minister, Edi Rama, said that if Albania and Albanian-dominated Kosovo were not both accepted for EU membership, which would “unite” them in effect, they would <a href="http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-albania-kosovo-unification-idUKKBN0MY19320150407">attempt formal unification by themselves</a>. As Serbia’s angry response made plain, such an attempt could reignite the highly incendiary issue of Kosovo’s status.</p>
<p>These are some of the forces behind the rising tensions in Macedonia, in addition to demands for democratic rights for Albanians in the structures of power. The country has seen spikes of violence before, but they have primarily been episodic; there is as yet no reason to expect another extended violent conflict. But recent Balkan history shows that when these sorts of crises arise, decisive international intervention is absolutely necessary to stop them deepening. If the EU accession process is not restarted, things could get worse, and quickly.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/76875/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Maria Koinova receives funding from European Research Council Project, Diasporas and Contested Sovereignty</span></em></p>If the western Balkan countries can’t join the EU, their complicated ethnic politics might boil over once again.Maria Koinova, Reader in International Relations, PI for the ERC Starting Grant "Diasporas and Contested Sovereignty" and author of "Ethnonationalist Conflict in Postcommunist States: Varieties of Governance in Bulgaria, Macedonia and Kosovo" (UPENN 2013), University of WarwickLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/592702016-05-17T09:41:19Z2016-05-17T09:41:19ZGreeks rally to help as EU-Turkey deal leaves migrants locked up in limbo<p>Recent <a href="http://greece.greekreporter.com/2016/04/26/clashes-with-underage-refugees-and-riot-police-in-lesvos-hotspot/#sthash.BT78W0KR.dpuf">riots between groups</a> of unaccompanied minors and police at the detention centre of Moria on the island of Lesbos are a stark reminder of the dire situation faced by more than 50,000 refugees from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq fleeing to safety along with various other migrants. They are now trapped in Greece. </p>
<p>After visiting refugee settlements in Lesbos and Piraeus and speaking to people helping the refugees, it is clear to me that the EU and Greek government are failing to provide even basic necessities to the thousands of people who have been used to deter further arrivals from Turkey. </p>
<p>The young refugees in Moria have been protesting against being imprisoned in a former military garrison for almost two months now, living in poor conditions but facing uncertainty about their future. There are 3,000 people living in facilities designed to accommodate a third of that number. I witnessed people fighting for food in queues. </p>
<p>Earlier in April, people from the makeshift camps in the Greek village of <a href="http://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/generation-emigration/idomeni-i-heard-screams-as-people-ran-from-the-border-fence-1.2613677">Idomeni were reportedly</a> teargassed and shot with rubber bullets by the Macedonian guards for attempting to cross the razor fence that sealed the border. </p>
<p>Currently, there are still more than 10,000 people who have been surviving for months in the open fields near the border between Greece and Macedonia, mostly through the help of volunteers and the local population. Nearly 3,000 refugees and migrants <a href="http://greece.greekreporter.com/2016/04/28/2680-refugees-in-piraeus-port/">are also still</a> in the port of Piraeus near Athens, including many women and children sharing several toilet facilities while being fed by people and organisations donating food parcels. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/122459/original/image-20160513-10687-1slr1gq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/122459/original/image-20160513-10687-1slr1gq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/122459/original/image-20160513-10687-1slr1gq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/122459/original/image-20160513-10687-1slr1gq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/122459/original/image-20160513-10687-1slr1gq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/122459/original/image-20160513-10687-1slr1gq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/122459/original/image-20160513-10687-1slr1gq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Living on the edge.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marianna Fotaki.</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Deal no ‘success’</h2>
<p>The EU’s leaders bear direct responsibility for this appalling treatment of people who have nowhere else to turn. In an effort to stem the flow of refugees to Europe via the eastern Mediterranean route used <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-35416741">by more than 850,000 people in 2015</a>, in March <a href="http://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2016/03/18-eu-turkey-statement/">the EU agreed</a> a heavily criticised “one-in-one out” deal that returns all refugees and migrants reaching Greece back to Turkey. In “return”, the EU has committed to resettling one refugee for each returnee, but only up to 72,000 people. This policy is now mostly applied to Syrians – Afghanis or Iraqis are <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/21/chaos-greek-islands-three-tier-refugee-registration-system-syria-lesbos">no longer considered refugees</a> despite the continuing instability and war in both countries. </p>
<p>It is difficult to see how the deal <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-36121083">“is working”</a> when many innocent people who have tried to flee to safety are locked in prison-like facilities and others who are vulnerable are left uncared for. Volunteers saw women with their newborn babies returning from hospital to the tents in the Piraeus port. The disabled and those with war-related post traumatic stress disorders have to endure living in subhuman conditions.</p>
<p>In the weeks since the EU-Turkey migration deal was signed, <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/press-releases/2016/04/eu-turkey-refugees-merkel-tusk-timmermans/">Amnesty International</a> and other organisations have documented refugees being denied entry to Turkey at the Syrian border, being shot at by security forces and being forcibly returned back to their war-torn country. </p>
<p>Legal scholars <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-law-professor-assesses-the-eu-plan-to-send-asylum-seekers-back-to-turkey-56535">have questioned</a> whether the deal could violate refugee requirements for adequate protection enshrined in the Geneva Convention. The deal might also potentially condone <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2016/03/turkey-safe-country-sham-revealed-dozens-of-afghans-returned/">further violations of refugee rights</a> in other places in the Middle East and Turkey – hardly a safe place to return refugees to start with. </p>
<p>Even worse, it may not stop refugees and migrants reaching the Greek islands or prevent deaths in the sea. <a href="http://www.iom.int/news/mediterranean-migrant-arrivals-2016-180245-deaths-1232">According to unofficial data</a> from the International Organisation for Migration, after the deal was implemented arrivals initially decreased to an average of 100 a day but since April 16, the number has risen to just over 150 a day.</p>
<p>Treating refugees as people whose essential human needs are somehow of lesser value than our own sets a dangerous precedent. As anthropologist <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/transformation/henrietta-l-moore/protest-politics-and-ethical-imagination#">Henrietta Moore observed</a>, the challenge for democratic politics is a double one: how we share this world with others and how we imagine ourselves in relation to them.</p>
<h2>Greeks rally round</h2>
<p>The responses of the inhabitants in Lesbos and other Greek islands to the arrivals of hundreds of thousands of refugees and migrants have varied. Populations comprising higher numbers of descendants of refugees have been more receptive on the whole. But in general, witnessing extreme human distress <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/apr/25/migrant-boat-crisis-the-sergeant-who-did-his-duty-towards-people-struggling-for-their-lives">has mobilised selfless</a> and often heroic actions by Greek inhabitants of the islands.</p>
<p>In Greece, ravaged by the financial crisis, the massive arrivals of refugees has allowed people who have found themselves to be newly poor, and those who have long been marginalised, to regain their sense of purpose and meaning in life by helping others. As Yiannis (not his real name), an unemployed former salesman from Mytilene told me: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Cooking and offering free meals to refugees gave me back my sense of dignity and self-worth. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>In my fieldwork, I’ve found that displays of empathy and compassion had a contagious effect on behaviours of entire communities. As a fisherman from Skala Sykamnias in Lesbos, a sea-side community with just over 150 inhabitants, explained to me: “There is not much choice when you find a boat full of scared people in the night.” He added: “The sight of shivering people moved even those who did not want them in the village in the first place.” </p>
<p>For years, successive Greek governments <a href="http://eipcp.net/policies/rozakou/en">have tried to depoliticise volunteering by professionalising it</a> in order to control “subversive modes of sociality” by solidarity organisations assisting refugees. </p>
<p>This strategy has now been extended to attacking and <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/greece-volunteers-arrested-lesbos_us_56b37bdde4b01d80b2454c6f">criminalising</a> independently minded volunteer organisations. By undermining grassroots solidarity and locking up the hapless people as hostages of the European “success story”, the left-leaning Syriza government has turned into an enforcer of the EU’s brutal refugee policies.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/59270/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marianna Fotaki is affiliated with the Centre for Health and the Public Interest (<a href="http://chpi.org.uk">http://chpi.org.uk</a>), where she is the Executive Management Team member and a Co-director pro bono. </span></em></p>A report from Lesbos, where thousands of refugees are living in inhumane conditions.Marianna Fotaki, Network Fellow, Edmond J Safra Center for Ethics, Harvard University and Professor of Business Ethics, Warwick Business School, University of WarwickLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/555902016-03-01T17:56:53Z2016-03-01T17:56:53ZHow Macedonia found itself at the centre of Europe’s refugee crisis<p>Distressing scenes have been unfolding on Macedonia’s border with Greece, where police have been using <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/01/world/europe/greece-macedonia-border-refugees-riots.html">tear gas</a> on refugees attempting to break through a razor wire fence designed to keep them out.</p>
<p>Given the recent tone of the debate about the migrant crisis, it is all too easy to dismiss this response as heavy handed. But Macedonia is a small state caught up in a domestic crisis of its own. It aspires to join Europe but has seen many of its would-be partners turn their backs on this shared burden. </p>
<h2>Trouble at home</h2>
<p>Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski was <a href="http://www.dw.com/en/macedonia-prime-minister-gruevski-agrees-to-step-down/a-18981614">forced to step down</a> in January after a series of recorded telephone conversations was released by the opposition Social Democratic Party, which alleged widespread wiretapping and grave abuses of power by senior government officials. It confirmed widespread suspicions that the national security service had no real oversight and was <a href="http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/news_corner/news/news-files/20150619_recommendations_of_the_senior_experts_group.pdf">overstretching its surveillance powers</a>.</p>
<p>With the help of the EU and the US, Macedonia’s main political parties have negotiated <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/25/world/europe/macedonia-elections-postponed.html?_r=0">early parliamentary elections</a> in June. The ruling party’s secretary general Emil Dimitriev is acting as prime minister for the interim government until the elections.</p>
<p>There is often a desire to blame the legacy of socialism when problems like these arise in countries like Macedonia. But the politicians implicated in this scandal have embraced a bold anti-communist, anti-Yugoslav discourse.</p>
<p>However the entire region, made up of the former Yugoslavia – and indeed some Eastern European states such as Hungary and Poland – has actually witnessed a perpetuation of the worst practices from the socialist period and the abandonment of the positives – many of which could be seen as European values.</p>
<p>So we see a lack of media freedom and a blurring between political parties and the state but also weakening welfare states and a loss of social justice, workers’ rights and emancipatory values.</p>
<p>The Macedonian scandal also revealed electoral fraud and has soured relations somewhat with the EU – not least because the ruling party recently <a href="http://macedoniaonline.eu/content/view/28907/45/">broke off cooperation</a> with EU facilitator Peter Vanhoutte. Hence, the government is increasingly seen as lacking legitimacy by its EU and American partners. </p>
<h2>So much for solidarity</h2>
<p>Then comes the international crisis. Hungary, an EU member state widely criticised for its own type of hybrid authoritarianism, was the first to erect <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-33802453">barbed wire fences</a> to stem the inflow of migrants and refugees.</p>
<p>This led to a diversion in the migrant route. People trying to reach western Europe trudged through Croatia, Slovenia and Austria. Now Macedonia has erected its own in an attempt to keep out the people trying to cross its border with Greece after travelling across the sea.</p>
<p>The recent distressing scenes from the border came after Austria announced that it is introducing new rules that would allow no more than 3,200 migrants and refugees onto its territory per day and impose a daily limit of 80 on the number of asylum claims that can be made.</p>
<p>Macedonian foreign minister <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrhCeF0ZHQI">Nikola Popovski</a> echoed an often repeated concern when he said that these scenes were a consequence of Europe’s fragmented response to the refugee crisis – and, for that matter, the Syrian civil war.</p>
<p>While Macedonia, a land-locked country of 2m people, is an EU candidate country, it is not an official member of the Union or the Schengen Area. It is undergoing its own internal political crisis and happens to be on the migrant route.</p>
<p>Geographically, this small nation finds itself caught between Greece, the main arrival point for refugees seeking shelter in Europe, and a vast area of countries unwilling to help them. </p>
<p>The Visegrad Group of EU countries – Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic and Slovakia – pioneered an anti-Islamic approach to talking about the migrant crisis, warning that the people fleeing Syria could not be culturally accommodated in their lands. They came up with the idea of sealing off their borders with Balkan countries to prevent migrants from coming in. That left the Balkan countries to deal with the situation. They tend to see themselves as victims of a highly incoherent EU approach to the refugee crisis.</p>
<p>Although it is not practically possible for Macedonia to play a leading role in handling this crisis, some Balkan governments – including the Macedonian administration – do share some of the fears about the “islamisation” of their countries and of Europe. Some are indeed ideologically close to Hungary’s Prime Minister <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/23/refugees-look-like-an-army-says-hungarian-pm-viktor-orban">Viktor Orban</a>, who vocally opposes taking in refugees from Syria for these reasons.</p>
<p>At least the general public are striking out on their own. In spite of their corrupt and populist governments, ordinary citizens of Macedonia and of the other countries on the Balkan migrant route have mobilised to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAFq2btMAVo">help the refugees</a>. These could be seen as acts of solidarity but also as acts of protest against their own government. </p>
<p>The disturbing scenes on the Macedonian-Greek border must be viewed as a symptom of a larger European problem. EU member states such as Austria are being allowed to act unilaterally by closing down borders. The group as a whole is failing to forge a unified, humanitarian response that would reflect Europe’s original values.</p>
<p>Macedonia aspires to be a member of the European Union. The existing members are hardly setting a good example.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/55590/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ljubica Spaskovska does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Tear gas on refugees isn’t good PR for a country that wants to join the European Union. But then other countries in the EU aren’t coming off too well either.Ljubica Spaskovska, Associate Research Fellow in History, University of ExeterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/528262016-01-07T13:43:53Z2016-01-07T13:43:53ZPolitics in Macedonia has descended into a corrupt soap opera<p>There was a time when Macedonia looked like the poster-child of successful anti-corruption in the Balkans. The country’s scores in the various corruption indices were improving and a nuanced anti-corruption infrastructure appeared to be developing. </p>
<p>No longer. After a <a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/macedonia-tens-thousands-rally-skopje-demanding-corrupt-government-steps-down-1501736">slew of corruption allegations</a> in 2015, an <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/16/world/europe/macedonias-prime-minister-to-step-down-paving-way-for-april-elections.html?_r=0">EU-orchestrated deal</a> has helped push the country’s prime minister, Nikola Gruevski, to promise to resign. A success for the EU? Of sorts, but the 28 member block still needs to do plenty of thinking about how it goes about trying to persuade prospective and current members to tackle corruption. </p>
<p>Macedonia is a young democracy. Independent since 1991 and a member of the UN since 1993, it is a country that has spent two decades trying to find its political feet. The country is not alone in experiencing problems along the path to democracy, but an ongoing <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/16/macedonia-open-to-changing-its-name-to-end-24-year-dispute-with-greece">dispute with Greece</a> over the use of the name Macedonia and a political system where power is heavily concentrated in a relatively closed group of elites has done little to help. </p>
<p>Nevertheless, by March 2004, Macedonia was doing well enough to apply for membership of the EU and in December 2005 the country was <a href="http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/countries/detailed-country-information/fyrom/index_en.htm">offered candidate status</a>. For a period afterwards many things improved –initial <a href="http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/countries/detailed-country-information/former-yugoslav-republic-of-macedonia/index_en.htm">EU Progress Reports</a> in this area noted that the government appeared to be both taking political corruption seriously and trying tentatively to do <a href="http://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/ourwork/democraticgovernance/projects_and_initiatives/Fighting-corruption-improve-governance-FYROM.html">something about it</a>. </p>
<h2>Things fall apart</h2>
<p>But a decade later, Macedonia lurches from one corruption-induced <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/27/fears-macedonias-fragile-democracy-amid-coup-wiretap-claims">crisis</a> to the next. In February 2015, Gruevski’s political opponents began releasing <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/ap/article-2996038/Macedonia-premier-denounces-opposition-leader-tapes.html">covertly recorded tapes</a> revealing that members of the governing party appeared to be exerting undue influence on the judiciary and public administration – as well as the media. </p>
<p>They have also revealed evidence suggesting that the governing party has rigged election results. Indeed, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/22/world/europe/macedonia-government-is-blamed-for-wiretapping-scandal.html">the tapes indicated</a> that the prime minister and several of his allies (predominantly ministers and MPs) apparently had strong and consistent control over most public institutions. </p>
<p>There was also the suggestion that the interior ministry had been party to the <a href="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/macedonia-officials-attempted-murder-cover-up-opposition-claims">alleged cover-up</a> of the death, at the hands of police, of a young demonstrator on election night in 2011.</p>
<p>The ensuing crisis has done little to help Macedonia’s aspirations to join the EU. In the summer of 2015 the EU nonetheless managed to broker a deal between the various parties – the so-called “<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/16/world/europe/macedonias-prime-minister-to-step-down-paving-way-for-april-elections.html?_r=0">Prizno agreement</a>”. </p>
<p>The two main outcomes of the Prizno agreement are that elections must be held by April 24, 2016 and that the prime minister much resign at least 100 days prior to this – by January 15 2016. The other is the establishment of a special prosecutor’s office with the sole purpose of investigating and prosecuting corruption allegations that stemmed from the tapes. </p>
<p>But the process appears to have run into problems. The special prosecutor has since been appointed, but she has <a href="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/eu-mounts-pressure-over-new-prosecution-in-macedonia-09-08-2015">faced strong opposition</a> and has been effectively denied the resources promised to her under Prizno.</p>
<p>Meanwhile <a href="http://www.independent.mk/articles/26190/State+Election+Commission+Elects+Dobre+Jancev+as+Secretary+General">the election of the secretary general</a> of the State Election Commission (which will oversee the mechanics of the forthcoming poll), only took place on January 4, 2016, a good two months later than planned, and opposition parties have complained that the commission won’t be able to organise a free and fair election in time. </p>
<p>For its part, the ruling party, VMRO DPMNE, has announced that if the April 24 election is postponed (which is a distinct possibility) then this will be taken as an indication that the Prizno Agreement has failed and Gruevski will not resign. Neither he nor his party will then seek to fulfil its requirements. </p>
<p>The situation is a mess. And, as things stand, it is anything but clear how this particular episode will end.</p>
<h2>Tragic farce</h2>
<p>This is a tragedy not just for the Macedonians who have to live in what is tantamount to an ongoing soap opera, but also for the EU. And there are subsequently clear lessons that the EU needs to learn both in terms of how it seeks to tackle corruption and how it encourages prospective member states to move forward in this area. </p>
<p>The EU was expected to be the main driving force for positive reforms in Macedonia, but the accession process has been well and truly <a href="https://euobserver.com/enlargement/131049">stalled</a>. The EU has been unable to offer positive incentives for Macedonian politicians to undertake reforms which has given political elites an excuse to maintain the status quo and the corrupt practices that have served them well. </p>
<p>VMRO DPMNE has held power in Macedonia for almost a decade. The opposition is weak and has been able to do very little to stop – or even draw attention to – a host of regressive trends in a range of areas of which corruption is just one. </p>
<p>If the EU wants to influence and maintain positive trends in the fight against corruption in Macedonia, or indeed any country that is seeking to join, then it needs to provide relevant incentives for reform. After 10 years as a candidate member, Macedonia’s leaders have rationalised that the EU is not serious about letting the country in. Macedonian elites have subsequently shown little interest in undertaking reforms that would be manifestly against their own (economic and political) interests. Only with the events of 2015, and the release of the telephone tapes, have we seen anything resembling an impetus for change. </p>
<p>With <a href="http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/643407b0-a587-11e5-a91e-162b86790c58.html#axzz3wVd4o79l">no compromise</a> in sight with Greece over the name of the country, the EU is in an impossible position. Turkeys, as they say, don’t vote for Christmas – and expecting Macedonia’s bickering politicians to undertake reform is fanciful. Reform takes place when interested parties have an interest in undertaking it – and in this case that means finding a path towards Macedonian membership of the EU. Even then, a whole host of challenges will remain, but there will at least be the prospect of change taking place. Eventually.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52826/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Liljana Cvetanoska receives funding from University of Sussex Doctoral School. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Daniel Hough does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Riven by political corruption and patronage, Macedonia’s EU membership looks further away than ever.Liljana Cvetanoska, PhD researcher, University of SussexDaniel Hough, Professor of Politics, University of SussexLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.