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Explanation: Before North Macedonia was North Macedonia, it was just Macedonia. This upset Greece so much that they spent several decades cockblocking Macedonia from the EU and NATO purely over the matter of the name of Macedonia belonging to Greece, in Greece's strange opinion.
More ironically. Greece was the initial reason Macedonia focused on that name as part of their identity. After the balkan wars, Greece was very keen to not have a strong Bulgaria, so they were agitating what is now Macedonia to be Macedonia, while Bulgaria was trying to convince them to join Bulgaria as a lost brother nation. It became a hot issue only in recent times after the Greek junta fell and the right wing discovered they could use it as a conspiracy theory and to get the nationalist vote. Now the roles are reversed with Greece telling Macedonians they're actually Bulgarians, while the Bulgarians don't want them anymore and support them being called Macedonians π
The sheer pettiness and inconsistency of international disputes can be astounding.
Truly a Balkan tale
A tale of two Balkans
In an impressive backfire, the Greek subborness inspired North Macedonians to start claiming actual Greek heritage. Like building statuses of Alexander the Great and similar.
Prior to that they were proudly Slavic, (North) Macedonian identity wasn't anything more than belonging to a geographic region.
Let me add fuel to the fire if you may
Maybe country borders aren't that important and maybe it would be better if they didn't exist or somethingπ
We were in Skopje the day after they changed the name from the placeholder FYROM to North Macedonia. Going to the national museum that the former government (the one that made all the "historical" monuments and buildings) had created, with all the propaganda extolling their right to control 'greater Macedonia' (including Thessaloniki), I think it's naive to view this as a petty naming dispute.
I think 'North Macedonia' was a good compromise, even if it made the Golden Dawn cry (generally I'm for anything that makes them cry, actually). Of course, I know a lot of non-Nazi Greeks that also were against them using the name, but I thought their arguments were generally of a nationalistic nature (Macedonia is Greece!).
North Macedonia is so fetch.
Not to be confused with South Macedonia.
I was in Skopje for a wedding last year, very interesting country. Felt very Balkans to me, minus of course the βGreekβ statues.
Itβs funny to think about this useless arguments of pride between nations, but the effect is very much serious. Itβs a poor country, which probably would be very different as an EU member,
Itβs a poor country, which probably would be very different as ~~an EU member,~~ a member of Yugoslavia.
There, fixed it for you.
I think that option was nonviable when the Serbs decided they preferred Yugoslavia to be a Serbian state with some vassals.
Suuuure buddy... What western fairy tale are you going to tell me next?