Political murders in the Balkans
Great leaders, ideologues and visionaries have always been a target and a thorn in the side of those who want to achieve their goals with undemocratic methods. Changes that mean progress, clearing up with the past, with crime, or with the retrograde ambitions of individuals and groups, are often too painful for those who are affected by those changes.
Macedonians and Bulgarians still argue about whether they or we are the founders of modern terrorism. Namely, the organization known as VMRO, which in its existence has changed several names such as BMORK, TMORO, VMORO, VMRO (United, autonomist, supremacist, etc.) in the history of these spaces is known as an organization that is the inventor of what we today we know as terrorism. Its entire history is replete with murders, assassinations and mutual confrontations of the leaders of the organization primarily disputing its character in terms of whether it is fighting for the unification of all Bulgarians or, on the other hand, for the establishment of an independent Macedonian state. Its activities do not end only inside the organization, it also takes actions aimed against the Ottoman Empire, but also the great powers of that time (Thessalonica assassins). Inside the organization, there was a continuous battle, both ideological and real, for the supremacy of one (Macedonian) or the other (Bulgarian) idea, and the winner was the one who first pressed the trigger of the revolver and killed the opponent. So, Todor Alexandrov kills (among others), Jane Sandanski, Gjorche Petrov and Dimo Hadji Dimov, Alexander Protogerov kills Alexandrov, and Protogerov is liquidated by Vancho Mihailov, etc., etc.
Of course, one of the most famous assassins of Vancho Mihailov, who also gained an international "reputation", is the Bulgarian from Velingrad, Velichko Dimitrov Kerin, who we know under the pseudonym Vlado Chernozemski. On October 9, 1934, in the French city of Marseille, he killed the Yugoslav king Aleksandar I Karađorđević and the French minister of foreign affairs, Louis Bartou. The murder of Karađorđević was ordered by Mussolini, and the immediate executors were the Croatian Ustashi of Ante Pavelic, who had close cooperation with VMRO, and Vancho Mihailov, who in turn gave him his "best" killer to do the dirty work. The murder of the Yugoslav king significantly shook the complex international situation in Yugoslavia, and the minor heir Petar II was not able to cope with the big challenges that were coming.
Soon after, World War II breaks out, when murders, in and of themselves, were part of everyday life. Ante Pavelić receives his Independent State of Croatia as a reward, and Vancho Mihailov remains short-sleeved. Namely, Hitler offered him, after the capitulation of Bulgaria in 1944, to create an independent state in Macedonia. He stays in Skopje for a short time and realizes that he lacks one very important element for a state, and that is the people. No one gave Mihailov support for Hitler's idea, because the majority of the population was either involved in or supported the National Liberation Struggle of the Macedonian people for national liberation, after which he left Macedonia forever and spent the rest of his life in Rome. all the way defending the Bulgarian cause and the idea that Macedonia is Bulgarian. He died of natural causes on September 5, 1990, on the eve of Macedonian independence.
Just one year later, Macedonia votes in a referendum on independence and sovereignty and gets its first president, Kiro Gligorov. His long experience in the labyrinths of Yugoslav politics is of great help to him in the performance of his office, which had as its primary objective to make Macedonia a self-sustaining, functional, independent state in the turbulent period of the disintegration of the former federation and the wars that were fought in the immediate neighborhood. . At that time Serbia was ruled by the undisputed Slobodan Milosevic, whose behavior could not be easily predicted, his next steps depended on the current state of the geopolitical chessboard. Coincidence or not, only one day after the meeting with Milosevic, on October 3, 1995, Gligorov was assassinated. The initial forecasts were not rosy. Gligorov was 78 years old at the time, but still managed to survive, recover and even finish his second term. In contrast, the investigation into the assassination never ended. The assassins, as well as the masterminds, were never discovered. All that remained were speculations, which were not proven in the investigation, that either the Bulgarian company "Multigroup" or the Serbian intelligence service KOS were involved in the assassination. The assassination of Gligorov significantly shook the young Macedonian state, but it failed to achieve its goal, which I assume was the complete destabilization of Macedonia and its involvement in the wider regional conflict. Gligorov's wisdom and experience largely managed to keep us out of the war in the Balkans, this was not liked by some, who, well, in that way tried unsuccessfully to change the course of history.
Eight years later in Belgrade, other assassins succeeded in their goal. Zoran Djindjic was the first democratically elected Prime Minister of Serbia after the fall of Milosevic. His leadership, wisdom and vision were a good starting position for the development of Serbia, getting out of the decades-long darkness of the Milosevic regime and integrating it into the normal Euro-Atlantic flows. First of all, it implied a complete break with the police-mafia structures that were an integral part of Serbian politics and government. The special police unit - JSO, or better known among the people as "Red Berets", was a state within a state. Those several hundred members of the unit, who came from various structures, from the underground to loyal servants of the Milosevic regime, could not reconcile themselves to the fact that one day their arbitrariness would have to be put an end to. And as I mentioned at the beginning of this text, it is important to be the first to pull the trigger. They did it on March 12, 2003 and killed Zoran Djindjic with two shots in front of the door of the Government, and with him the idea of Serbia becoming a modern Western European-oriented state went to hell with him. Unlike Macedonia, where the victim survived and the assassins were never discovered, in Serbia they were discovered and arrested in the first days after the assassination, but Djindjic failed to win the final battle. After his death, the process of dismantling what was known as the DOS (the united opposition that succeeded in dethroning Milosevic) began, only to soon be restored to power by Milosevic's SPS, which emerged from the renegades of Vojislav's Radical Party. Seselj, the pseudo-nationalists of Kostunica and the current government of SNS and Aleksandar Vucic. This assassination is a textbook example of how the course of history can be changed with just one or two shots. With this murder, Serbia returned to its worst "factory settings".
Great leaders, ideologues and visionaries have always been a target and a thorn in the side of those who want to achieve their goals with undemocratic methods. Changes that mean progress, clearing up with the past, with crime, or with the retrograde ambitions of individuals and groups are often too painful for those who are affected by those changes. As a rule, these are radicals who cannot come to terms with the fact that the people in democratic elections have given power to those who have the strength and knowledge to fight for the good of their country. These others fight only for their personal interests and goals, and therefore when there is a situation where those two forces oppose each other, very often the most extreme methods are resorted to, such as taking human lives, in order to prevent those new flows and things to remain unchanged. Fortunately for the current office holders in the Balkan states, the possibility of assassinations is significantly reduced because it is proportional to the size and vision of the leaders who are getting smaller and smaller every year.
(The author is a lawyer)
