THE AGREEMENT BETWEEN NOF AND KPG

The first contacts between the NOF delegations and the memebrs of KPG were initiated in the month of April 1946 and the negotiations to unite were commenced in May of the same year. The first round of negotiations was held in Solun with the participation of Nikos Zachariadis - general secretary of KPG and the members: Markos Vafiadis, Leonidas Springos and on the part of NOF, the secretary Paskal Mitrevski.

At those negotiations, agreement was reached on the following issues:
- NOF to continue and to be the sole organization of the Macedonians in Aegean Macedonia and to be managed by KPG;
- Macedonian partizan units to continue and be preserved, and every region to form joint headquarters comprised of Macedonians and Greeks.
- Macedonian cadres to be co-opted into the leadership of KPG

Immediately after the hard won agreement was concluded, the KPG leadership unilaterally changed the conditions of the agreement to its own advantage and to the detriment of NOF.

The new condition imposed by KPG was as follows:
- Dismantling the Macedonian military units and joining with the Greek ones, and the right to form military headquarters to be solely under the party leadership of KPG.

The leaders of NOF did not agree with this and commenced negotiations again. The negotiations between the leadership of NOF and KPG lasted for a long while and an agreement was eventually concluded on 21 November 1946 at the village Turje.

During the time of the negotiations, three Macedonian units comprised of more than 360 active fighter-volunteers operated in the Lerin and Kostur regions while the Greek units had 95 fighters.

The agreement was concluded in favour of KPG.

The following results were achieved in the new agreement:
- NOF and AFZ to continue to exist and operate but to be under the direct control of KPG;
- The Macedonian partisan units to unite with the Greek ones and to be under joint command, selected by the leadership of KPG;
- The Macedonian youth organization NOMS to be dismantled and its members to join the Greek youth organization EPON under the direction of KPG.

The execution of such a shameful agreement between NOF and KPG did not appeal to the Macedonian people.

After the agreement the KPG cadres did not wait long. They immediately nominated Greek cadres as leaders for all of the Macedonian formations even though there was not a single Greek partisan in any unit, band or battalion. The KPG leadership took advantage of the weakness of the leadership of NOF and in the most sophisticated way, in a short time after the agreement, managed to exchange the Macedonian "military" with Greek cadres.

< Return to Index or Next Chapter >