Last week, from Konitsa, the President of the Republic stressed that the Prespa Agreement “must be interpreted and implemented according to its letter and spirit, in a manner that leaves no room for irredentism.” Indeed, given that the Agreement fully puts an end to irredentism (see particularly Article 4 (3) and the amendment of Article 49 of the neighbouring country’s Constitution), it should be self-evident, especially following its ratification, that all political powers would refer to it in order to defend the country's rights against any misinterpretation thereof.
Unfortunately, New Democracy, on the occasion of an imprecise and misconstrued BBC report, continues with the contradictory, dangerous, and irresponsible practice of its President who, following the outrageous “discovery” on Politico “of separatist tendencies in Northern Greece,” declared to Angela Merkel that “he will not permit the ‘Catalanisation’ of Northern Greece.”
Similar extreme stances mar the fixed position of our foreign policy on the non-existence of any other minority other than the religious one outlined in the Treaty of Lausanne.
The report rehashed New Democracy’s argument about supposed recognition of a Macedonian ethnicity, which has been shot down not only by political opposition but by the constitutional revision itself in the neighbouring country (Amendment XXXIII, which expressly stipulates that nationality “does not define nor does it predetermine the ethnicity to which citizens belong.”) There was a formal response on this level also, and as regards the non-existent “Macedonian minority.”
The time has come for New Democracy to stop reiterating positions that reflect neither reality nor the provisions of the Agreement, but rather seriously harm the interests of our country.
February 26, 2019