RFE on Bishop Jovan

RADIO FREE EUROPE/ RADIO LIBERTY: "MACEDONIAN GOVERNMENT CONFIRMS JAIL SENTENCE FOR MAVERICK CLERIC

An appeals court in Bitola confirmed on 23 June that Serbian Orthodox Bishop Jovan must spend 18 months in jail for allegedly inciting religious and ethnic hatred, Reuters reported. Jovan, who became a central figure in the long-standing dispute between the Macedonian Orthodox Church (MPC) and the Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC) when he switched allegiance from MPC to the SPC in 2003, was sentenced in August 2004 (see 'RFE/RL Newsline,' 20 August 2004 and 'RFE/RL Balkan Report,' 23 January and 6 August 2004). Jovan must now surrender to police within eight days or risk arrest. He said after the appeals court handed down its ruling that he is 'ready to go to jail if that is what the court says.' The central problem is deeply rooted in what historians call the Macedonian Question and interrelated issues involving the traditional Balkan tendency to equate one's nationality with one's religion. In 1967, the communist Macedonian authorities recognized a MPC separate from the SPC and the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, which has a much smaller number of Macedonian adherents than the other two. The SPC and other Orthodox churches do not recognize their Macedonian counterpart, regarding it as schismatic. PM"