Interesting.The dispute seems ridiculous from this distance, however one person's farce is another's tragedy. I'm always fascinated how some immigrants who are 'multicultural' supporters in Australia don't seem to have the same sentiments in regard to their homelands.

Whatever the Macedonians ethnic and cultural affinities, the ancient Greeks thought that they were barbarians and not genuine Greeks. I doubt if the average 4th century BC Athenian would have wanted to 'own Alexander', before his successful rampage through Asia.

Perhaps Australia is not the only country 'searching for identity'.

"Nationality is a matter of self-ascription"

This maybe so but there HAS to be some give and take between the competing nations. Something the Slavic speakers from FYROM refuse to do.

Just say Greece decides to split into two? A decision is made to split the country into north and south.

They called the southern section 'Greece', and the northern section 'Macedonia'.

What happens to FYROM? What will they be called?

See my point?

“The perceived threat may actually be quite different. Does the Government of the Hellenic Republic need the dispute with its small neighbour in order to bolster national unity?”

Perhaps it does:
it doesn’t seem to have learned much in the couple of millennia since the rival city-states were at each other’s throats.
How could the barbarians of Sparta be expected to rub shoulders in national conformity with the philosophers of Athens

[Deleted for abuse.]

I always find it fascinating those that call FYROM nationalists "Macedonians" on the basis of self-identification... are the exact same ones who always end up changing the rules when it comes to ancient Macedonians..... who self-identified as Greeks for centuries at the ancient Olympics.

"Men of Athens... In truth I would not tell it to you if I did not care so much for all Hellas (Greece); I myself am by ancient descent a Greek, and I would not willingly see Hellas change her freedom for slavery. " (Speech of Alexander I of Macedonia upon being admitted to the Olympic games as a self-identifying Greek, Herodotus, " Histories", 9.45, ed. A. D. Godley)

It would be fun to go back in time and watch Mr.Hill (and the supporters of the former self-identifying ethnic Bulgarians of the former Yugoslavia) tell ancient Macedonians they weren't Greeks. My guess is Alexander would have cleaved him in two faster than a Gordian Knot.

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[Deleted for arguing a moderation decision on the forum.]

Someone deleted my first post, so I am going to trying again and point out (what some supporters of FYROM like Mr. Hill seem to be consciously trying to hide)... what FYROM's own elected politicians used to claim about their own identity a few years ago.

'We do not claim to be descendants of Alexander the Great.'
(FYROM'S Ambassador Ljubica Acevshka in speech to US representatives in Washington on January 22 1999)

'We are not related to the northern Greeks who produced leaders like Philip and Alexander the Great. We are a Slav people and our language is closely related to Bulgarian.'(FYROM´s Ambassador to Canada Gyordan Veselinov in interview to Ottawa Citizen Newspaper 24 February 1999)

"We are Slavs who came to this area in the sixth century ... We are not descendants of the ancient Macedonians" (Kiro Gligorov, FYROM's first President to Foreign Information Service Daily Report, Eastern Europe, February 26, 1992)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uA3kwC2YTq4

"The creation of the Macedonian nation, for almost half of a century, was done in a condition of single-party dictatorship. In those times, there was no difference between science and ideology, so the “Macedonian” historiography, unopposed by anybody, comfortably performed a selection of the historic material from which the “Macedonian” identity was created. There is nothing atypical here for the process of the creation of any modern nation, except when falsification from the type of substitution of the word “Bulgarian” with the word “Macedonian” were made." (Denko Maleski, former Minister of foreign affairs of FYROM from 1991 to 1993 in an interview to FYROM newspaper Utrinski Vesnik)
http://www.utrinski.com.mk/?ItemID=C7A7DD4ECD45C946BF6573284EC01164

Pletho's post wasn't deleted by "someone" it was deleted by me. He knew that because he received an email from me which says at the bottom that I am the Chief Editor and Founder of this site.

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Graham Young

The problem over who 'owns' Alexander derives from the fact that he was born in Pella, Macedonia, which today is in Greece. In antiquity, however, Pella was in a part of the whole area of Macedonia, now split between today's Greek province and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

So he's Macedonian, but from the bit which is now Greece.

While it ought to make a lot of practical sense to define the modern nations of FYROM and Greece in terms of their modern history, the 'self-identification' goes back a long way before then. The wording of Alexander's appeal to qualify for the Olympics attest to that.

The Hellenic Republic and its supporters in Australia must move away from a culture of intimidation and ethnic intolerance of Macedonians, Jews, Turks, Vlachs, Albanians, Australians and others and move to a culture of peace and ethnic co-existence and mutual respect.

The Macedonians are not Greek, Bulgarian or Serbian. They do not identify with the countries that invaded them in 1912/13 and then forcefully tried to assimilate or expel the indigenous population.

Macedonia and its people are confident with their cultural heritage and identity and are in the process of educating the world about the history of Macedonia and its peaceful nature.

As Darwin noted as the species left the African continent.....great prophets said that the cave men will never see eye to eye, and he was right. The people that still fight overland, shows how much monkey some people still are, and Iam not talking about the hair on your backs.

So! Do you think you chimps can play nice? and they say man is evolving.....lol.........not from what Ive read here.

How about I give you a box of bananas to argue over, instead of land that your for-fathers stole from each other.

So.....string up old battles just make you the monkey ass:)

What's in a name............try Deep Blue..........:)

This is the 21 century, is it not:) The world has more to worry about than who owns the dirt.

Over-population is showing its ugly face once more.....and its only the beginning.

Oh Dear:)

BLUE