Besides the conflicts, who were the individuals that promoted friendship and cooperation between Balkan nations?

[u/theDivic]

We often discuss the wars and conflicts in Balkan history, but I’m curious about the other side. Who are some notable individuals, leaders, intellectuals, or even everyday people who worked to build understanding, cooperation, or friendship between Balkan nations?

I don’t mean the mainstream political figures we always hear about, like Tito or the broader Yugoslav “Brotherhood and Unity” project. I’m more interested in lesser-known writers, thinkers, or activists - people like Esad Mekuli, the Kosovo Albanian poet who helped shape modern Albanian literature and also translated works from Serbo-Croatian, bridging cultural spheres.

On the Serbian side, an example might be Dobrica Ćosić in his early years, before his later nationalist reputation - back then he wrote sympathetically about Albanian issues and advocated for their recognition within Yugoslavia (though his views later shifted dramatically).

Who are other such figures - from any Balkan country - who genuinely tried to bridge divides rather than deepen them?

[u/BelgradeNikola]

I would agree about everything exept the death of Orešković because to this day we dont know the full picture, a number of potential stories were made but no official one. Some say partizans killed him, some say chetniks did it, some say Ustashe and some say he was killed by Croatian thugs. Sadly we will probably never know the real reason.

[u/Magistar_Idrisi → u/BelgradeNikola]

There's really no proof at all that he was killed by the Partisans, or even by Croats. Communist agitprop accused the Chetniks of murdering Orešković in 1941, and that was kind of taken for granted for decades. That probably wasn't true, either.

The people who killed him were literal bandits, who just happened to be ethnic Serbs. They killed Orešković for material gain - they took all of his belongings. It's possible that they realized he was a Communist, which definitely wouldn't have helped Orešković's chances, but there's no proof that any Chetnik command ordered his execution.

[u/BelgradeNikola → u/Magistar_Idrisi]

We cant realy tell, for context here are some Serbian and Croatian texts.

https://www.vecernji.hr/vijesti/tvrdnja-partije-nediferencirani-ustanici-su-ubili-krntiju-592102

https://www.maxportal.hr/vijesti/partizani-su-ga-ubili-a-onda-pjevali-oj-ustase-jadna-li-vam-majka/

https://stanjestvari.com/2021/10/26/vladimir-bursac-smrt-marka-oreskovica-kao-test-za-komunisticku-istoriografiju/

[u/Magistar_Idrisi → u/BelgradeNikola]

Yeah, I know about that. Maxportal is a fringe Ustaša website, so obviously they want to blame the Communists. (They also made up the chant in their title lol, it went "oj četnici jadna li vam majka...")

The one about "non-differentiated rebels" is kinda true, at least from the title, but that's basically what I was saying. He was killed by bandits (who used to be rebels a few months earlier).

The stuff about rival Communists being behind Orešković's murder mostly comes from Gojko Polovina and his memoirs... but that's pure conjecture on his part. He thought Žigić and others could kill Orešković because he criticized them - and then Orešković died. QED? Not really, no.