Pavlos Voskopoulos (; born 25 November 1964) or Pavle Voskopulos () is a Greek politician, a member of the collective leadership of the

Rainbow A rainbow is an optical phenomenon caused by refraction, internal reflection and dispersion of light in water droplets resulting in a continuous spectrum of light appearing in the sky. The rainbow takes the form of a multicoloured circular ...

party that represents the Slavic–speaking minority (identifying as ethnic Macedonian) in Greek Macedonia.

Biography

Voskopoulos, an ethnic Macedonian, was born in 1964 in Florina, Greece, to a Macedonian–speaking family. His grandmother spoke no Greek. He uses the Slavic

patronymic A patronymic, or patronym, is a component of a personal name based on the given name of one's father, grandfather (more specifically an avonymic), or an earlier male ancestor. It is the male equivalent of a matronymic. Patronymics are used, b ...

Filipov (Филипов), his family's traditional name, which was changed to Voskopoulos (his application to change back was rejected by the Greek government). The Mayor of Florina, Ioannis Voskopoulos is his cousin.. "The situation was very tense those days in Florina. Town mayor, Yiannis Voskopoulos (a cousin of Rainbow supporter Pavlos) started a campaign to collect signatures protesting the Accord." Voskopoulos has a B.A in Architecture and is an architect. He participated in Greek local elections in 1993 representing the organisation MAKIVE (Macedonian Movement for Balkan Prosperity) and secured 14 percent of the vote. Voskopoulos was a founder of the Rainbow Party, a political party in Greece representing the Macedonian minority. He has been one of its leading figures. The party opened its first office in the Greek city of Florina on 6 September 1995. On 14 September he, along with three other members of the Rainbow Party were charged with "having caused and incited mutual hatred among the citizens" by the local Florina court. Soon organisations such as Amnesty International came to the support of the members of the Rainbow Party, claiming that they would become "prisoners of conscience" if they were to be jailed for the offence.Amnesty International will adopt members of ‘Rainbow’ party as prisoners of conscience in case of imprisonment
/ref> Voskopoulos has sought recognition for the Rainbow Party and Macedonian minority. He has said the party seeks minority rights for Greek citizens and opposes intervention from

North Macedonia North Macedonia, officially the Republic of North Macedonia, is a landlocked country in Southeast Europe. It shares land borders with Greece to the south, Albania to the west, Bulgaria to the east, Kosovo to the northwest and Serbia to the n ...

or other countries. Voskopoulos has stated the policies of 21st century Greece lack the recognition of "otherness" within the national myth of homogeneity. In appearances on Greek TV, he has used the

Macedonian language Macedonian ( ; , , ) is an Eastern South Slavic language. It is part of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family, and is one of the Slavic languages, which are part of a larger Balto-Slavic languages, Balto-Slavic branch. Sp ...

phrase of the Rainbow Party ''Gore Glavata'' (keep your head up) in reference to Macedonian socio–cultural affirmation.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Voskopoulos, Pavlos 1964 births Slavic speakers of Greek Macedonia Living people People from Florina Greek architects Rainbow (Greece) politicians Greek human rights activists