Posted on 07/12/2018 7:25:46 AM PDT by CondoleezzaProtege
Four Russian diplomats will be banned from Greece after evidence revealed Russia was trying to foment opposition to a historic deal between Greece and Macedonia that is likely to pave the way for Macedonia’s Nato membership and so weaken Russian influence in the western Balkans.
Russia, involved in a wider struggle for influence with the EU across the region, has already been accused of backing a failed coup in Montenegro in 2016.
Russia said it would respond to the Greek expulsions by taking similar steps against Greek diplomats in Moscow.
The expulsion of the diplomats, revealed in the Greek media on Wednesday but relayed by the Greek government to Russia on 6 July, follows evidence they were encouraging rallies to oppose the Macedonian name deal, including offering bribes to opponents of the deal.
The historic naming deal, agreed on 17 June, will see the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia bow to Greek objections and change its name to Northern Macedonia. Greece had claimed the title Macedonia implied a territorial claim on the Greek province of the same name.
The Greek newspaper Kathimerini named the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society, an organisation which promotes Russian ties to Christians in the Middle East, as being among the groups trying to fan Russian influence in Greece, including in the Greek Orthodox monastic community of Mount Athos.
A representative of the society denied it was involved in any alleged attempts to bribe senior Greek Orthodox clergymen, the Russian state Interfax news agency reported.
In 2008 Nato agreed to invite Macedonia to join the military alliance once its name dispute was settled, and Wednesday’s Nato summit meeting in Brussels will conclude with a formal invitation to join Nato.
(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...
Cleverly joining in the last few years of NATO’s existence. ..
« Mourir pour Macedonia ? »
What is going to happen to all the Macedonian content farmers?
LOL, let me know when the Greeks grow the balls to expel the Turks from Constantinople, or even NATO, or Cyprus, or anything else.
At first I thought: Oh the poor Greeks and their inferiority/superiority complex. And where did Alexander the Great coem from. Well actually, the Greeks have it right. The ancient kingdom of Macedon, led by Alexander The Great’s father, and was known sometimes as the Macedonian Kingdom was mostly in what is now northern Greece, until it conquered all of Greece. Modern Macedonia, now “North Mecedonia” WAS north Macedon & the center of from where Phillip and Alexander ruled.
The Russians consider themselves the leader of the pan Slavic “movement” and the protector of Slavic peoples. It explains their interest in the Balkans which rose to the top after the assassination of archduke Ferdinand in 1914 and the various response and treaty obligations.
The Greeks of the 5th and 4th centuries B.C. did not think much of the Macedonians and some sources call them barbarians--the use of Greek was widespread up there (Euripides died at the court of the king of Macedonia), but whether the native Macedonian language was a dialect of Greek or a separate (but related) language is debated--insufficient ancient evidence. Modern Greeks, of course, claim that the ancient Macedonians were Greek. Much of the Greek population of modern Macedonia is descended from Greeks who fled from Turkey in the 1920s.
Greece pays its 2% which many other Nato members do not.....like Germany, for instance. Shouldn’t there be a little more respect for Greece?
Yes. And while Greece has issues, they are good to work with... just watch your wallet. :-()
“The area which is now the Republic of Macedonia was conquered by Philip II. The original heartland of the Macedonians was within modern Greece-”
As I said.
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