Macedonia Demolishes

MONASTERY IN MACEDONIA DEMOLISHED; ANOTHER CHURCH DEMOLITION PLANNED
Metropolitan To Be Jailed?

By Michael Ireland
Chief Correspondent, ASSIST News Service

Oct 21/04

MACEDONIA (ANS) -- A Macedonian government official has refused to confirm or deny media reports that the government intends to demolish the Serbian Orthodox Church in the village of Luzani, and that a religious leader is threatened with imprisonment.

The reports follow the surprise nighttime destruction of the St John Chrysostom Monastery in Nizepole, southern Macedonia -- which contained Metropolitan Jovan (Vranisskovski) and about 10 monks and nuns -- by approximately 500 police armed with automatic weapons, and demolition workers with bulldozers.

According to a report by Drasko Djenovic, writing for the Fourm18 news service, the monastery was the cathedral of the Archbishopric of Ohrid, and was earlier this year attacked by a paramilitary 'state security' unit armed with machine guns. Officials in Bitola have refused to discuss the monastery demolition with Forum 18.

Metropolitan Jovan is separately being threatened with an 18 month jail sentence, and told Forum 18 that he expects his appeal against the sentence will be turned down.

Dr Cane Mojanovski, president of the Macedonian government's committee for relations with religious communities, refused to confirm or deny to Forum
18 News Service on October 20 reports from Metropolitan Jovan (Vranisskovski) and the media in Belgrade that the Macedonian government intends to demolish a Serbian Orthodox church in Luzani village, near Prilep in south central Macedonia, referring all enquiries to the building inspectorate.

Metropolitan Jovan told Forum 18 that the church is threatened with destruction even though a building permit was issued for it in September. Metropolitan Jovan heads the Macedonian archbishopric of the Serbian Orthodox Church, which is not recognized by the Macedonian government (see F18News 23 September 2004 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=418).

The intended church demolition comes after the sudden and unexpected demolition, just before midnight on the night of October 15-16, of the Serbian Orthodox monastery of St John Chrysostom in the village of Nizepole, near Bitola in southern Macedonia.

About 500 police from the capital Skopje, armed with automatic weapons, surrounded the monastery while Metropolitan Jovan was inside with about 10 monks and nuns. At the same time, police blocked the Ohrid - Bitola - Nizepole road.

Workers then used bulldozers to demolish the monastery, as well as walls stabilizing the steep terrain on which the monastery was built. The monastery was the cathedral of the Serbian Orthodox Archbishopric of Ohrid, in Macedonia.

The authorities have claimed that the reason for the monastery's demolition is that it did not have a building permit. Forum 18 made eight calls on October 21 to various officials of the Bitola administration, but no one was prepared to discuss the reasons for monastery's demolition. Once Forum 18 had explained why it was calling, officials immediately referred the questions to other offices.

Dr Mojanovski told Forum 18 that he cannot comment on the acts of other state institutions, and that the demolition of church buildings is under the authority of the building inspectorate.

The monastery was built in a village, and in its vicinity are more than 50 solidly constructed buildings none of which has a building permit, as is normal in Macedonia for villages of this type.

The land on which the monastery stood belongs to Metropolitan Jovan's parents, Galina and Argira Vranisskovski, and their house -- which was recently robbed and damaged by fire -- is about 100 metres (100 yards) from the site of the monastery.

Even though in planning terms their house, like the other village houses, has the same legal status as the monastery, the building inspectorate has shown no interest in any of the village's houses.

Metropolitan Jovan told Forum 18 on October 20 that he had gone to Bitola's building inspectorate after the monastery's destruction to ask for the formal legal decree ordering the destruction, but officials told him that
there was no decree.

They said they had received an order from Skopje and then placed an "information paper" announcing the intended demolition of the monastery on the town hall notice board. When Metropolitan Jovan asked to see a copy of this "information paper", the officials told him that they no longer had it.

The demolition is the latest in a long series of attacks by Macedonian authorities on the Serbian Orthodox Church in Macedonia.

Among numerous other incidents, Metropolitan Jovan has been jailed, as well as another bishop and a monk fined (see F18News 28 January 2004 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=238), and the now-demolished monastery was attacked last February with machine guns by a paramilitary "state security unit" (see F18News 24 February 2004 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=259).

A day before the destruction of the monastery, October 15, Metropolitan Jovan received the results of an appeal against a mid-August court decision that he be sentenced to 18 months' imprisonment for "spreading religious, national and racist intolerance", charges he rejects (see F18News 23 September 2004
http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=418). He told Forum 18 that he has 15 days to make another appeal, but that he expects that this will be turned down and that he will be sent to jail again.

The Macedonian state has prevented any rival Orthodox jurisdiction to the Macedonian Orthodox Church from existing in the country (see F18News 23 September 2004 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=418).

On October 18 the MIA state news agency reported that "representatives of the Macedonian Orthodox Church clergy and monastic order fully support the Synod of the Macedonian Orthodox Church in its efforts to preserve the church, its name, autocephaly status and dignity."

The Macedonian Orthodox Church claimed autocephaly (complete independence) from the Serbian Orthodox Church in 1967, but no other canonical Orthodox Church in the world recognizes this.

Note that the formally recognized name of Macedonia in international law is "The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia."

Macedonian-Serbian Church Dispute Enters New Round
MAP: Macedonia

MAP: Macedonia

Thursday, 22 January 2004
The long-standing feud between the Serbian Orthodox Church and the Macedonian Orthodox Church entered a new round in early January, just before Orthodox Christmas, when the leaders of each Church decided that talks would do no good.

In their respective addresses to believers on 5 January both Patriarch Pavle, who leads the Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC), and Macedonian Orthodox Church (MPC) head Archbishop Gospodin Gospodin Stefan, signaled that renewed talks between the two churches do not make much sense, at least for the time being.

The church leaders' pessimistic view is mainly due to the failure to resolve the question as to whether the MPC is an autocephalous church of its own. Having gained what the SPC describes as a "far-reaching autonomy" in 1959, the MPC split from the SPC in 1967 without the consent of the Serbian Holy Synod. As a result, the MPC was never recognized by other Orthodox Churches.

Bilateral talks to resolve this question resulted in the so-called Nis accord of July 2002, which could have been a basis for further discussion had it not been rejected by the majority of Macedonian bishops. The main obstacle for the MPC's Holy Synod to accept the agreement was that the SPC insisted on the canonic unity of the two churches.

But one Macedonian bishop, Jovan of Veles, did not follow his colleagues and instead put his bishopric under the canonic jurisdiction of the Serbian Church. In response, the MPC's Holy Synod excommunicated Jovan. The SPC, in turn, named him Serbian exarch of the Serbian Orthodox Church for Macedonia in September 2002. Macedonian media call Jovan either by his former lay name, Zoran Vraniskovski, or simply "the schismatic" (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 26 September 2002, and "RFE/RL Balkan Report," 12 July 2002).

For his move Vraniskovski was not only outlawed by his church and the media, but also by the Macedonian authorities. After what the SPC described as a "manipulated trial" in October 2003, a court in Bitola found him guilty of "usurping an office" and sentenced him to one year in prison, suspended in favor of two-years' probation. His crime was that he had baptized a relative despite having been excommunicated from the MPC.

The churches, for their part, carried on trading accusations instead of seeking some kind of compromise. In May 2003, the SPC set up an autonomous Archbishopric of Ohrid, naming Bishop Jovan as its head (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 28 May 2003). In his 5 January address, MPC Archbishop Gospodin Gospodin Stefan charged that by setting up this autonomous archbishopric, the SPC has greatly disturbed the "spiritual peace" of the Macedonian believers. He added that in such a situation the MPC will concentrate on its own "spiritual renewal" to strengthen it against further "challenges and evils."

Serbian Orthodox Patriarch Pavle, for his part, the same day called on the "brothers and sisters in Macedonia" to unite around the newly founded Archbishopric of Ohrid (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 6 January 2004).

Only days later, on 11 January, police again detained Bishop Jovan and a group of clerics belonging to the SPC in Bitola. At first, the Interior Ministry declared that neighbors had called the police because the clerics had threatened them with weapons. But the same day a Bitola court officially charged Bishop Jovan with inciting national and religious hatred and intolerance (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 12 and 15 January 2004).

In the meantime, Macedonian politicians also joined in the church dispute. Whereas Prime Minister Branko Crvenkovski tried to remain neutral by expressing his hope that the feud will not affect Macedonia's relations with Serbia and Montenegro, President Boris Trajkovski -- himself a Protestant minister -- clearly took sides with the MPC. "The formation of a parallel Holy Synod for...Macedonia by the Serbian Orthodox Church is an attack not only on the Macedonian autocephalous Orthodox Church, but also a direct attack on the sovereignty of...Macedonia and on the national feelings of the Macedonian people," a joint statement by Trajkovski and Archbishop Gospodin Gospodin Stefan said in December.

In January, Trajkovski refused to intervene on Bishop Jovan's behalf when Patriarch Pavle asked him to do so. Currently, the opposition Internal Revolutionary Organization (VMRO-DPMNE), which sees itself in the tradition of European Christian Democratic parties, is preparing a parliamentary declaration in support of the MPC. Since the MPC is explicitly mentioned in the constitution along with four other religious communities, politicians may argue that they are not only defending the church, but also the constitution. But this constitutional provision also restricts religious freedom, human rights activist Mirjana Najcevska of the Macedonian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights noted in "Dnevnik" on 10 January.

It is not yet clear whether the governing Social Democrats will also endorse the declaration. The country's ethnic Albanians -- who are overwhelmingly Muslim -- and their parties have declined to get involved in the church dispute, as was to be expected.

Written by Ulrich Buechsenschutz

MACEDONIAN PRESIDENT DEFENDS MACEDONIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH

Thursday, 4 December 2003
After a meeting with Macedonian Orthodox Church (MPC) head Archbishop Gospodin Gospodin Stefan in Skopje on 3 December, President Boris Trajkovski strongly condemned the decision of the Serbian Orthodox Church to set up an autonomous archbishopric in Macedonia, Makfax news agency reported. "The formation of a parallel Holy Synod for...Macedonia by the Serbian Orthodox Church is an attack not only on the Macedonian autocephalous Orthodox Church, but also a direct attack on the sovereignty of...Macedonia and on the national feelings of the Macedonian people," a joint statement by Trajkovski and the archbishop said. The MPC, which split from the Serbian Orthodox Church in 1967 with the help of the communist authorities, is not recognized by other Orthodox churches. In October, Russian Orthodox Church head Patriarch Aleksii II offered to mediate in the church dispute (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 26 September 2002 and 28 May and 25 July 2003, and "RFE/RL Balkan Report," 12 July 2002).

MACEDONIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH PROTESTS AGAINST 'MALICIOUS INTERFERENCE IN INTERNAL AFFAIRS'

Sept 27/04 - Rferl - The Holy Synod of the Macedonian Orthodox Church (MPC) has sent letters to the Bulgarian and Greek Orthodox Churches to protest against the participation of Bulgarian Bishop Kiril of Varna and Greek Metropolitan Ignatios of Volos in a 19 September meeting with Jovan Vraniskovski, who is the representative of the Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC) in Macedonia, "Utrinski vesnik" reported on 25 September. According to the Holy Synod, the meeting with Vraniskovski's "schismatic organization" amounted to "malicious interference in the internal affairs of our autocephalous Macedonian Orthodox Church." Vraniskovski, or Bishop Jovan, is a former bishop of the MPC who put his bishopric under the canonical jurisdiction of the SPC and was then excommunicated by the MPC. Late in 2003, the SPC named Bishop Jovan the head of its autonomous Archbishopric of Ohrid. In August, a Macedonian court sentenced him for allegedly inciting religious hatred. Neither the SPC nor any other Orthodox churches recognize the MPC, regarding it as schismatic and the creation of the former Yugoslav communist authorities

(see "RFE/RL Newsline," 4 December 2003, and 6 and 15 January, 20 August, and 24 September 2004, and "RFE/RL Balkan Report," 12 July 2002, and 23 January and 6 August 2004). UB
Copyright (c) 2004/05. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. www.rferl.org

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