PARITY
OR HOLY WAR
The
Macedonian constitution enshrines the rights of Albanians
to speak their own language, and receive primary and secondary
school education in their own tongue. The Macedonian state
subsidizes the Albanian language media quite generously,
including Albanian-language newspapers, radio and television
programs. Flaka, a major Albanian-language newspaper,
receives 67% of its operating costs from the state budget.
The Helsinki Human Rights Group report
on Macedonia confirmed that "despite government funding
Flaka remains editorially independent and has never
been interfered with by the state, according to its deputy
editor Daut Dauti." While Macedonian is, unsurprisingly,
the official language of Macedonia – that is, the
language in which state business is carried out –
minority languages are also guaranteed a place at the
table: Albanian and other minority languages are in official
use not only where the majority of the inhabitants are
Albanian, but also "where there is a considerable number
of inhabitants belonging to [the Albanian] nationality,
their language and alphabet are also in official use,
in addition to the Macedonian language and Cyrillic alphabet,
under conditions and in a manner determined by law." But
that isn't good enough for the Albanians, who make up
some 30 percent of the population, for whom nothing less
than parity with the majority is acceptable.
LINGUISTIC
LUNACY
This
lunatic linguistic intransigence is a metaphor for the
stance of the Albanian nationalists who are now battling
Macedonian troops for control of Tetovo,
Macedonia's second largest city: for their goal is not
integration into Macedonian society, but linguistic, cultural,
and eventually political separation from the Macedonian
state and union with a "Greater Albania." Unleashed and
emboldened by NATO's unswerving support, the partisans
of Greater Albania have used the politics of racial, religious
and ethnic grievance to split Macedonian society into
warring factions and set up the conditions for another
Balkan war – this time one that could bring in Greece,
Bulgaria, and Turkey, as well as Albania, the former Yugoslavia,
and the KLA. The way they have accomplished this division
is a perfect paradigm for the militantly multicultural
mindset that dominates such disparate American institutions
as college campuses, and the national political scene,
including most recently the Republican party. As an exaggeration,
albeit an entirely consistent and logical one, of our
own ethnic correctness, let the Macedonian civil war stand
as a warning: in the Balkans, Albanian versions of Al
Sharpton and his followers are bringing the region to
the brink of a conflagration.
THE
CRUCIBLE
The
division of Macedonian society into warring ethnic camps
is exemplified by events taking place in the crucible
of that struggle: Tetovo. It is there that the Albanian
flag has been raised in an open show of support for Albanian
secessionism, and the city, situated in western Macedonia,
has long been the backdrop of the country's longest-running
ethnic dispute. But first, a little background. . . .
AN
IMAGINARY COUNTRY
The
locus of Albanian ultra-nationalism has long been the
two-pronged demand for a separate Albanian-language university
and ethnic quotas in the Macedonian civil serve, with
the former serving as a transmission belt for the latter.
But the Macedonian government – a coalition including
the Albanian Democratic Party – has resisted this
demand, rightly fearing the atomization of their country.
After all, the classification of "Macedonian" as a separate
language, unique to itself, like English French, and German,
is quite a stretch: it is more like a regional dialect,
one with Serbo-Croatian and Bulgarian influences (both
of which, like Macedonian, are written in the Cyrillic
alphabet). Indeed, as far as the Bulgarians are concerned,
there is no such language as "Macedonian," but only a
dialect of Bulgarian: the Serbo-Croatian speakers in Macedonia
proper hold a similar view. The fragility of this linguistic
nationalism is, furthermore, exacerbated by the historical
reality that no such country as "Macedonia" has had a
separate existence since the days of Alexander the Great:
its resurrection by Tito and the Yugoslav Communists was
merely a crude attempt to intervene on the Communist side
in the Greek civil war. This, however, has not deterred
"Macedonian" nationalists from determinedly averring their
linguistic and cultural uniqueness, and fiercely defending
their (largely imaginary) national identity. Against the
genuine cultural chauvinism of the Albanian fanatics,
however, the faux nationalism of the "Macedonians"
is a weak reed bending in a strong wind.
TETOVO
PROTEST
In
January 1995, an independent, Albanian-language university
was set up in Tetovo in western Macedonia. The opening
of the university was the occasion for a riot in which
one person died: while the government did not forbid the
opening of an Albanian-language university, neither did
they agree to fund it with tax dollars – an omission
that outraged the protesters, who took to the streets.
The OSCE stepped in, agreed to mediate the issue, and
came up with the compromise solution that a private university
would be founded in Tetovo, with funds from European donors.
This was rejected by the Albanians and the self-proclaimed
rector of Tetevo U, who would settle for nothing less
than a state-subsidized university, one that, in addition,
guaranteed its graduates a certain proportion of government
jobs.
TETOVO
U: ALBANIAN DIPLOMA MILL
What
the Albanian radicals are after, in Tetovo, was made clear
in a report issued by the International Helsinki Federation
for Human Rights, which sent a delegation to Tetovo consisting
of former university professors and administrators. According
to their report, they "were surprised that the two leading
officials at Tetovo University had no documentation on
hand concerning the names and qualifications of faculty,
the programs and courses offered, and the composition
and intellectual quality of the student body. Indeed,
contrary to what a published statement describing the
visit said, we were not given detailed answers to all
our questions. We are still waiting for written information."
All
we need to know about "Tetovo University" is contained
in a single paragraph of the IHF report:
"While
officials of Tetovo University deny the creation of a
"parallel institution," and indicate that the institution
is bilingual in principle and practice, the same officials
speak of educating students who will practice in professions
(law, medicine, etc.) as members of the specifically Albanian
community. The continuation of the institution in the
face of obstacles was termed a 'holy way,' and a map depicting
'Greater Albania' appears on the wall of the Dean's office."
UNIVERSITY
– OR BASE CAMP?
In
short, Tetovo U was all along intended as a base camp
for Albanian insurgents. Far from allowing themselves
to be assimilated peacefully into Macedonian society,
Albanian nationalists seek to assimilate a large chunk
of Macedonia into a "Greater Albania." The guerrilla war
now being conducted by the "National Liberation Army"
based in western Macedonia was prefigured by two infamous
incidents, one in Gostivar, in July 1997, when the Albanian
mayor raised the Albanian flag over the town, and an expedition
by Macedonian police to tear it down was followed by a
riot in which 3 people were killed and many more wounded.
The town council, which had voted to raise the double-headed
eagle of Albanian expansionism, also voted to raise the
Turkish flag – a move decried by the Turkish ambassador,
who claimed that it was a violation of Turkey's constitution
that the flag be flown anywhere outside its own country.
Still, the flags were not removed: the Parliament then
stepped in with a law forbidding the flying of foreign
flags over public buildings, and the police moved in to
enforce the law. (The Albanian Democratic Party deputies
voted with the majority.) In Tetovo, the mayor of the
town similarly defied both the Parliament and the nation's
highest court, the Constitutional Court. In their defiance,
these local officials symbolically proclaimed their political
objective: the dissolution of the Macedonian state.
THE
SOROS CONNECTION
The
make-believe country of Macedonia is a Yugoslavia in miniature:
with all the built-in problems of the latter even more
deeply embedded in its origins. Its first President, Kiro
Gligorov, was a longtime Communist bureaucrat who served
under Tito and, like Milosevic, made the transition to
the post-Communist political scene. Unlike old Slobo,
however, Gligorov obtained the invaluable
support of billionaire speculator and international do-gooder
George Soros, who literally bailed out Macedonia with
a generous loan and became the country's de facto ambassador-at-large,
lobbying for international recognition in the face of
an embargo declared by Greece. The Greeks, it seems, feel
threatened by the country's very name, Macedonia, which
is the same as Greece's northern province, and some aspects
of the Macedonian constitution, couched as it is in irredentist
language: when the Macedonian government published a textbook
showing a map of "Greater Macedonia," including large
chunks of Greece, Athens was not amused. In a [January
23]1995 New Yorker profile of Soros, the special
relationship between Soros and the Macedonian model of
"multiculturalism" was explored:
"Nowhere
has Soros put more energy and money into bolstering a
government than in Macedonia. "George is the savior of
Macedonia," his friend Morton Abramowitz declared. And
the Macedonian representative in Washington, Ljubica Acevska,
says of two separate Soros loans of twenty five million
dollars, 'People found it difficult to believe. The opposition
said, 'A country does not help you- why would an individual
help you?' Remember, twenty-five million dollars in Macedonia
is like billions here... the fact that Soros did it helped
the government a great deal.'"
MACEDONIAN
MULTI-CULTI
The
Macedonian branch of the omnipresent Soros-sponsored "Open
Society Institute" became the ideological nerve center
of the Gligorov government, and Soros proclaimed in public
that he would go to Macedonia if necessary and personally
campaign for the President to ensure his reelection. To
Soros, Macedonia – a completely made-up nation, without
a history or a real cultural basis – was the ideal
vessel in which to pour his dreams of the perfect model
of modern multi-culturalism. Seeking to explain why Soros
championed the Macedonian cause against the Greeks, the
New Yorker noted:
"In
the good-guy, bad-guy formulation to which Soros is so
partial, the Greeks became the bad guys. He did not go
to Greece to get the Greek view. In his few hours with
Gligorov, he became persuaded, as he often insisted since,
that Macedonia is the only multi-ethnic state left in
the Balkans with a government devoted to pluralism and
democratic principles- a view contested by many ethnic
Albanians, Macedonia's largest minority, who charge that
Gligorov's actions belie his words, and that they are
discriminated against in schooling, employment, and political
representation."
HONEYMOON'S
END
But
the
honeymoon was soon over: the Macedonians soured on
their benefactor when he began dictating policy to the
Gligorov government. In 1995, when Soros tried to intervene
in the dispute with Greece over Macedonia's name, proposing
that the country change its name to "Slavomakejonija,"
he was roundly rebuffed. Thanks for the advice, said the
Macedonians – but no thanks. They also told him to
take a walk over his insistence that the government cave
in to Albanian demands in Tetovo. A newspaper close to
the government, Nova Makedonija, accused Soros
of "publicly suggesting...the introduction of a second
official language into Macedonia through the back door."
The Skopje government saw the Tetovo incident as a provocation
aimed at destabilizing the region and annexing it to a
future "Greater Albania" – and, it turned out, they
were right.
A
PATTERN EMERGES
Isn't
it funny how, mixed in with the irony and tragedy that
is the theme of the Balkan story, we also have another
theme: George Soros, the eccentric billionaire who has
made his life's work a crusade against what he calls "unrestrained
capitalism" and yet is widely seen as the least restrained
of all capitalists. Aside from writing books attacking
the alleged "dangers" of laissez-faire capitalism, Soros
was also one of the most effective and relentless advocates
of US military intervention in the Balkans. The Soros-funded
Balkan Action Council brought together the top warmongers
in both parties, and among the intellectuals, mobilizing
public opinion behind the idea of US intervention on behalf
of the allegedly victimized Kosovars: Soros personally
spoke out in support of the Kosovo war, utilizing his
considerable influence with such Clinton era figures as
Strobe Talbott on behalf of the War Party. That war, in
turn, upset the ethnic balance of Macedonia, when a large
number of Kosovar refugees poured into the country –
and, with the help of Soros's "philanthropic" activism,
they have stayed there, settling in and staking their
claim to the extended borders of Greater Albania. Now,
having turned against the Macedonians, whose federal system
he saw as a possible model for his "open society," Soros
is having his revenge: a reenactment of what happened
in Kosovo, only this time with Skopje playing the role
once reserved for Belgrade. It is an ironic turn of events,
and, given Soros's record in the Balkans, an entirely
predictable one.
