ASNOM

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Anti-Fascist Assembly of the National Liberation of Macedonia (Macedonian: Антифашистичко собрание на народното ослободување на Македонија, Latinic: Antifašističko sobranie na narodnoto osloboduvanje na Makedonija, abbr. ASNOM) was the supreme legislative and executive people's representative body of the Macedonian state from 1944 until the end of World War II.

The first plenary session of ASNOM was convened on the symbolic date of August 2 (Ilinden-Preobrazhenie uprising day) 1944 in the St. Prohor Pcinjski Monastery near Kumanovo. The most important assembly decisions are the proclamation of the Macedonian state, proclamation of the Macedonian language as the official language of the Macedonian state. The citizens of Macedonia, regardless of their ethnic affiliation, were guaranteed all civil rights, as well as the right to their mother tongue and confession of faith.

ASNOM, as the supreme institution of government, also meant a de jure commencement of the constitutional law existence of Macedonia as a federate state within the framework of the Yugoslav federation. The Assembly issued a Manifesto which described the position of Macedonia under the old Yugoslavia as that of the colony, before declaring the brotherhood and unity with the other peoples of Yugoslavia. The Tito-Stalin split of 1948 and the defeat of the communists in the Greek Civil War ended Tito’s dream of uniting whole of region of Macedonia under his rule. Dejan Djokić claims that with Bulgaria once more reverting to denial of Macedonians as separate nation from Bulgarians and the victorious anti-communist Greek forces adamant in their own denial, the new Yugoslavia remained the only concrete medium for Macedonian aspirations to nationhood and quasi-statehood.^[1] It must be noted that some of the key members of ASNOM - Lazar Koliševski and Kiro Gligorov declared Bulgarian nationality in the beginning of the war.

The president of the Assembly was Metodija Andonov Cento. Cento's goal was to create a reunified Macedonia, either fully independent or as a republic within the new communist federal Yugoslavia, but he was opposed by Svetozar Vukmanović-Tempo, Tito’s envoy to Macedonia and Lazar Koliševski, the leader of the Macedonian Communist party. One of contributors in the Assembly was Kiro Gligorov, later the first President of the independent Macedonian state.