ON Thursday a film titled, A name is a name: a film about a nation being held hostage because of its name, will be shown at Melbourne’s Forum’s Theatre.
The film by Sigurjon Einarsson is described on its promotional material as, ‘A cross between a documentary and a feature film… a ‘road film’ made …over a period of seven months in the Republic of Macedonia’.
It was the description of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) as, ‘Republic of Macedonia’ which has angered the Australian Macedonian Advisory Council (AMAC).
In a prepared statement to Neos Kosmos AMAC wrote; “While the Australian Macedonian Advisory Council (AMAC) …welcomes artistic ventures and festivities which …represent the cultural diversity of Australia, it cannot sanction the use of material which promotes propaganda and highly insensitive material which may incite ethnic tension in an otherwise harmonious society.”
Talking to Neos Kosmos Con Kouremenos the President of AMAC said, “As Greek-Australians we should be supporting the position that Australia takes regarding this issue i.e. the continual use of the name FYROM, until a solution is found under the auspices of the United Nations.”
“Australia is a proud multicultural society, and therefore using the the name FYROM it is in line with name used officially by the UN, the EU and NATO, thus fair to its our multicultural community” added Mr Kouremenos.
He went on to underscore the efforts of AMAC in its “relentless effort to correct the historical inaccuracies which may have arisen.”
He added that, “Any historian or scholar involved in serious inquiry will be able to disclose that the history of Macedonia is an integral part of Greek history and that its actors were the Macedonian Greeks, from before Alexander the Great to the Greeks of the Byzantine Empire and the contemporary ones.”
Clearly, it is all over a name.