Hundreds of people who identify with FYROM marched to the steps of Parliament House in Victoria last Saturday in a protest remembering the ‘partition of Macedonia’ as they claimed. The march – organised by the ‘Macedonian Australian Community Organisation’ – was said to commemorate, they stated, the 100th anniversary of the division of Macedonia, as a result of the Bucharest Treaty signed on 10 August 1913.
The protestors claimed among others that Thessaloniki will become their capital again and that ‘Macedonia’ has been occupied and subsequently divided because of the treaty.
The organisers invited ‘Macedonians and all supporters of the oppressed nations in Melbourne’ to take part in the march. Their claim was that 1913 “began the agony of the Macedonian people”, because the Treaty of Bucharest led to the annexation of Macedonia by Bulgaria, Serbia and Greece.
However, irredentist claims for a greater ‘Macedonia’ were also part of the rallying concerns of the Melbourne protestors last week.
As was reported by Neos Kosmos last month, the aftermath of the Balkan Wars and the Bucharest treaty will be the subject of an international conference organised in Melbourne from September 4 to September 7 by the self-identified ‘Australian Macedonian Human Rights Committee’.
The Treaty of Bucharest was concluded on 10 August 1913, by the delegates of Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Montenegro and Greece. The Treaty was concluded in the aftermath of the Second Balkan War and amended the previous Treaty of London, which ended the First Balkan War.