The Church Mission Society Ireland has appointed the Rev Patrick Comerford as its new Regional Officer based in Dublin. CMS Ireland – the principal mission and development agency in the Church of Ireland – has a vision of every parish in mission and playing a meaningful role in the World Church by 2010.
As regional officer, Patrick will help carry forward this vision for a fast-growing programme of churches in mission. He will be part of a dynamic team responsible for promoting and developing the work of CMS Ireland, both in Ireland in partnership with dioceses overseas.
He expects to visit churches throughout Ireland, preaching, speaking and organising mission events and building a support network of parishes and people.
Patrick Comerford is a priest in the Church of Ireland and has worked for 30 years as a journalist with leading provincial and national newspapers. For the past eight years he has been Foreign Desk Editor of The Irish Times and has travelled throughout Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia reporting on international affairs.
Born in 1952, Patrick has a B.D. in theology from Maynooth, a Post-Graduate Diploma in Ecumenics from Trinity College Dublin and carried out post-graduate research in mission history at NUI Maynooth. He has a strong commitment to Muslim-Christian dialogue and chairs the board of the Church of Ireland Gazette. He has contributed to a number of books on church history and theology, including Christianity (ed. Patsy McGarry) and the forthcoming history of the laity in the Church of Ireland, All Sorts and Conditions.
He is married to Barbara, a social worker and they have two sons, Jamie and Joe. They enjoy holidays in Greece and Wexford and he includes poetry and the classics among his many other interests.
Patrick hopes to take up his new post with CMS Ireland on Monday 29 July 2002.
This press release was issued by the Church of Ireland Press Office on 24 June 2002
COMERFORD WAY: Patrick Comerford’s online journal on Anglicanism, theology, spirituality, history, architecture, travel, poetry, beach walks ... and more
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24 June 2002
01 June 2002
Yugoslavia consigned to history,
replaced by Serbia and Montenegro
By Patrick Comerford
Foreign Desk Editor
The Yugoslav parliament voted overwhelmingly yesterday in favour of a plan to abolish the Balkan federation and replace it with a looser union between its last remaining members, Serbia and Montenegro.
The move clears the way to work out the details of a new constitution from the blueprint, negotiated by the EU in March. The west is keen to head off a drive by Montenegro for independence that it fears would destabilise the region.
The parliaments of Serbia and Montenegro already had approved the plan, which would consign Yugoslavia to history after more than seven decades of existence in various forms. But analysts and diplomats still expect protracted negotiations over the details. The upper house passed the plan by 23 votes to six against and the lower house approved it by 74 to 23.
“Many people will see this day as the day when Yugoslavia died, because the name is no longer mentioned in the agreement - the new state is called Serbia and Montenegro,” the Serbian Deputy Prime Minister and Yugoslav deputy, Mr Zarko Korac, said.
The two republics would have broad autonomy within one internationally recognised state with its own president, parliament, cabinet and army to replace the federal institutions.
The original plan, signed on March 14th in Belgrade, envisaged a new constitution would be ready for approval by the three parliaments by the end of June. However, many analysts, diplomats and politicians say interpretations of the blueprint and ambitions for the new union already differ so widely that the prospect of agreement by then is remote.
The Speaker of the Lower House, Mr Dragoljub Micunovic, said he expected the new draft constitution to be finished by the autumn. Yugoslavia would cease to exist when it is adopted.
Pro-independence Montenegrin parties, for whom the scheme is at best a necessary evil to retain Western favour, set great store by a clause that allows them to revive independence plans in three years. But pro-Yugoslav parties there want close links to Serbia, and a directly elected parliament with a strong mandate.
For now, at least, the EU and NATO Secretary-General Mr Javier Solana have headed off Montenegrin independence. They feared that a planned breakaway referendum would encourage further violent redrawing of borders in the Balkans.
Yugoslavia – meaning southern Slavs – was formed at the end of the first World War, itself triggered by the independence aspirations of the south Slavs of the Balkans, with Serbia leading a unification movement.
The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Sarajevo triggered the first World War. At the time, the only independent south Slav states were Serbia – then incorporating Macedonia – and Montenegro. Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina were under the rule of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which crumbled at the end of the first World War. In 1915 Serbia and Montenegro were overrun by the Central Powers and Serbian troops retreated to the Greek island of Corfu.
In July 1917 representatives of the south Slavs proclaimed a kingdom under Peter I of Serbia, and Montenegro adhered in 1918. In December 1918, the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was proclaimed, and it was renamed Yugoslavia in 1929.
Yugoslavia joined the Axis pact in 1941, and Germany soon invaded. After the second World War, Tito came to power, but Yugoslavia was expelled from the Moscow-led Cominform in 1948.
Yugoslavia later became a leading light in the international non-aligned movement. After Tito's death in 1980, a collective presidency was introduced. In 1991 the Yugoslav republics of Croatia and Slovenia declared independence. With the rapid departure of four of Yugoslavia's original six constituent republics, the remaining two - Serbia and Montenegro - formed a new federation in 1992. Now the name “Yugoslavia” is being consigned to history, replaced by the new Federation of Serbia and Montenegro.
• This news report was published in The Irish Times on Saturday 1 June 2002.
Foreign Desk Editor
The Yugoslav parliament voted overwhelmingly yesterday in favour of a plan to abolish the Balkan federation and replace it with a looser union between its last remaining members, Serbia and Montenegro.
The move clears the way to work out the details of a new constitution from the blueprint, negotiated by the EU in March. The west is keen to head off a drive by Montenegro for independence that it fears would destabilise the region.
The parliaments of Serbia and Montenegro already had approved the plan, which would consign Yugoslavia to history after more than seven decades of existence in various forms. But analysts and diplomats still expect protracted negotiations over the details. The upper house passed the plan by 23 votes to six against and the lower house approved it by 74 to 23.
“Many people will see this day as the day when Yugoslavia died, because the name is no longer mentioned in the agreement - the new state is called Serbia and Montenegro,” the Serbian Deputy Prime Minister and Yugoslav deputy, Mr Zarko Korac, said.
The two republics would have broad autonomy within one internationally recognised state with its own president, parliament, cabinet and army to replace the federal institutions.
The original plan, signed on March 14th in Belgrade, envisaged a new constitution would be ready for approval by the three parliaments by the end of June. However, many analysts, diplomats and politicians say interpretations of the blueprint and ambitions for the new union already differ so widely that the prospect of agreement by then is remote.
The Speaker of the Lower House, Mr Dragoljub Micunovic, said he expected the new draft constitution to be finished by the autumn. Yugoslavia would cease to exist when it is adopted.
Pro-independence Montenegrin parties, for whom the scheme is at best a necessary evil to retain Western favour, set great store by a clause that allows them to revive independence plans in three years. But pro-Yugoslav parties there want close links to Serbia, and a directly elected parliament with a strong mandate.
For now, at least, the EU and NATO Secretary-General Mr Javier Solana have headed off Montenegrin independence. They feared that a planned breakaway referendum would encourage further violent redrawing of borders in the Balkans.
Yugoslavia – meaning southern Slavs – was formed at the end of the first World War, itself triggered by the independence aspirations of the south Slavs of the Balkans, with Serbia leading a unification movement.
The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Sarajevo triggered the first World War. At the time, the only independent south Slav states were Serbia – then incorporating Macedonia – and Montenegro. Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina were under the rule of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which crumbled at the end of the first World War. In 1915 Serbia and Montenegro were overrun by the Central Powers and Serbian troops retreated to the Greek island of Corfu.
In July 1917 representatives of the south Slavs proclaimed a kingdom under Peter I of Serbia, and Montenegro adhered in 1918. In December 1918, the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was proclaimed, and it was renamed Yugoslavia in 1929.
Yugoslavia joined the Axis pact in 1941, and Germany soon invaded. After the second World War, Tito came to power, but Yugoslavia was expelled from the Moscow-led Cominform in 1948.
Yugoslavia later became a leading light in the international non-aligned movement. After Tito's death in 1980, a collective presidency was introduced. In 1991 the Yugoslav republics of Croatia and Slovenia declared independence. With the rapid departure of four of Yugoslavia's original six constituent republics, the remaining two - Serbia and Montenegro - formed a new federation in 1992. Now the name “Yugoslavia” is being consigned to history, replaced by the new Federation of Serbia and Montenegro.
• This news report was published in The Irish Times on Saturday 1 June 2002.