FotoFACTS: Destruction of Albanian property and Islamic cultural objects Posted August 30, 2001
Destruction of Albanian property and Islamic cultural objects
Nikushtak: http://www.inter-liber.com/chom/images/foto2.htm
Likove: http://www.inter-liber.com/chom/images/foto3.htm
Shkup: http://www.inter-liber.com/chom/foto1.htm
FotoFACTS: Macedonian police brutality, abuse and massacres in Luboten/Ljuboten on Aug 11-12th, 2001 Posted August 30, 2001
Photographs from Luboten/Ljuboten
Macedonian police brutality, abuse and massacres in Luboten/Ljuboten on Aug 11th and 12th, 2001.
http://www.alb-net.com/amcc/abuse_violence.htm
Note: The pictures are very disturbing.
You can view more photographs at the following location:
http://www.alb-net.com/amcc/pics/ml/
http://www.alb-net.com/amcc/pics/ml/gb
http://www.alb-net.com/amcc/pics/ml/aq
Some of this pictures correspond directly to the Human Rights
Watch Report from Aug 22nd, 2001: "Police Abuse Against Albanians
Continues in Macedonia".
URL: http://www.hrw.org/press/2001/08/macedonia0822.htm
Worried Macedonians Weigh Public Vote on Peace Accord Posted August 30, 2001
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/world/A16155-2001Aug29.html
Worried Macedonians Weigh Public Vote on Peace Accord
Officials Fear Legislative Rejection of Pact, Seek Alternative
By Peter Finn
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, August 30, 2001; Page A26
SKOPJE, Macedonia, Aug. 29 -- Phase one of NATO's effort to disarm ethnic Albanian rebels ended today at an army base in a small Macedonian town. But in the capital, opponents of the country's peace plan signaled they will try to vote it down when it is put before parliament in coming days.
Western and moderate Macedonian officials, fearful this effort might succeed, are examining the possibility of stalling the vote in the legislature and taking the agreement directly to the people in a referendum.
That could force NATO to prolong its operation, which is supposed to be limited to the collection of arms over a strict 30-day period. A referendum could take at least 60 days to organize after a parliamentary vote authorizing one, or the collection of 150,000 signatures from among the population.
A referendum is "an option we're looking at," said a source close to President Boris Trajkovski, whose aides have indicated that approval of the peace accord is on a razor's edge in the 120-member parliament. Western officials have discussed the possibility of a referendum with Trajkovski and say public opinion is swinging toward support of the peace agreement.
Political leaders of the Slavic majority and the ethnic Albanian minority signed the accord two weeks ago. It calls for Albanian guerrillas, who have launched sporadic attacks on Slav-dominated government forces since February, to turn in their arms to NATO in return for enactment of a package of measures meant to increase rights for ethnic Albanian citizens.
A telephone opinion poll of 1,055 adults conducted last weekend by the Skopje-based Institute for Democracy, Solidarity and Civil Society showed that a bare majority of respondents, 50.3 percent, support the agreement. But it represented a significant jump from a poll conducted by a different organization immediately after the accord was signed.
A U.S.-funded media campaign to build support among Macedonians for the agreement began this week with television, radio and print advertisements. A Western-sponsored voter survey showed there is very little understanding in both ethnic groups of what the agreement actually says or means, and a major goal of the campaign is to increase public knowledge about the terms.
Among Macedonian Slavs, support for the agreement stands at 43.7 percent, according to the weekend poll; opponents generally contend the deal gives too much to the Albanians and that a full military assault against the guerrillas is the best alternative. Seventy-eight percent of ethnic Albanians favor the deal, the poll found.
Members of parliament, meanwhile, are coming under intense pressure to support the agreement or risk full-scale civil war and the country being globally isolated. Western diplomats are visiting with legislators and municipal leaders to build support for a yes vote.
"The pressure is overwhelming," one lawmaker said today.
NATO Secretary General George Robertson visited an army base in the town of Krivolak in southern Macedonia, where some of the 750 weapons surrendered so far by guerrillas of the National Liberation Army were displayed, and pronounced the program on track. "It is not just the number of weapons that matters," Robertson told reporters today, referring to claims that the guerrillas are giving up only a tiny portion of their cache, "it is the fact that the so-called NLA is handing over these weapons and disbanding as an organization."
"The members of parliament hold the future of this country in their hands," Robertson said, following lengthy talks with political leaders. "I can't tell whether this historic project is going to succeed, but the alternative will be horrifying."
The rebels are meant to disarm completely in three phases under the agreement, while parliament simultaneously initiates a three-step legislative process to adopt constitutional amendments, prepare drafts of the amendments, then vote on each amendment. The first step begins Friday and its successful conclusion requires a yes vote by 80 members of the 120-member assembly. The vote is to follow a debate that could extend into next week.
Attempts to scuttle the accord in parliament focus on a rump group in the party of Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski, according to Western officials, local leaders and a key legislator.
"I would not like it to be my destiny that a Macedonian killed me because I betrayed the nation," Danilo Gligorski, a member of Georgievski's governing party, said in an interview today. He described himself as leaning strongly toward voting against the agreement. "If I choose to be killed, I would rather be killed by a terrorist in the mountains."
According to Gligorski, the overwhelming majority of his colleagues in parliament oppose the accord, and its defeat is likely.
He estimated that the agreement will get only 50 to 55 favorable votes.
Western officials and other analysts dismissed those figures as exaggeration and said a group of about 10 young hard-line members of Georgievski's party could defy the leadership and vote no. But that would still allow the agreement to squeak through, analysts said.
"This is a small country not known for defiance," said Edward P. Joseph of the International Crisis Group, a Brussels research organization. "At the end of the day, they always roll."
And Ivica Bocevski, executive director of the democracy and solidarity institute, said parties here are disciplined and hierarchical, and that Georgievski can secure enough votes for passage while allowing a small group to dissent for symbolic purposes.
The prime minister, a reluctant signatory to the agreement, plans to meet with his parliamentary group Thursday night to urge them to at least allow the process to go forward from Friday even if they reserve the right to vote no at the end, legislators said. That would provide some breathing space for further lobbying and allow the return of displaced refugees to their homes, a critical issue for the dissenters.
Focus Shifts From Arms to Parliament in Macedonia Posted August 30, 2001
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010830/wl/balkans_macedonia_dc_407.html
Thursday August 30 7:28 PM ET
Focus Shifts From Arms to Parliament in Macedonia
By Andrew Gray
SKOPJE (Reuters) - Macedonia's parliament starts to debate planned constitutional reforms on Friday to give more rights to ethnic Albanians in the next phase of a delicate NATO (news - web sites)-backed plan aimed at averting civil war.
NATO soldiers have collected more than 1,400 weapons from ethnic Albanian rebels so far in their mission in the former Yugoslav republic. Alliance leaders say it is now time for Macedonian politicians to keep their side of the bargain.
Under a peace pact signed by all major political party leaders this month, Macedonia is meant to grant more rights to its substantial ethnic Albanian minority. The rebels have agreed to disarm and disband if those commitments are met.
Friday's parliament session, expected to start around 0900 GMT, will begin debating whether to start the process of ratifying the political package, which involves changes to the Macedonian constitution.
The debate could last several days and most observers expect a vote on Tuesday on whether to get the ball rolling.
A two-thirds majority in the 116-member assembly is required to initiate the process. After further scrutiny and debate of the reform plans, they end up back on the parliament floor for adoption, once again by a two-thirds majority.
Western diplomats and analysts generally expect the parliament to vote to get the process under way.
The reforms provide for a raft of measures including greater official use of the Albanian language, a big hike in the number of Albanians in the police, and government decentralization to allow Albanians to run more of their affairs in many areas.
They are intended to put a stop to an insurgency begun by the National Liberation Army guerrilla group in February.
SCORES KILLED
Scores of people have been killed and more than 100,000 displaced in a conflict which several times appeared to come close to descending into the full-scale warfare which has devastated much of the Balkans over the past decade.
NATO leaders have made clear that prospect could still become a reality if the peace process falters.
``One doesn't have to spell out the consequences of the alternative (to approving the accord),'' British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said on a visit to Macedonia on Thursday.
``The future of this agreement is in the hands of 116 members of the Macedonian parliament,'' he told reporters.
NATO aims to collect 3,300 weapons surrendered by the rebels during its 30-day mission in Macedonia, codenamed Operation Essential Harvest and expected to involve around 4,500 alliance soldiers. Four thousand of them are already on the ground.
NATO has given an upbeat assessment of the operation so far, noting it had aimed to gather only 1,100 arms by this stage.
``Within eight days we are at where we expected to be at about day 20 of this operation,'' said NATO spokesman Major Barry Johnson. The go-ahead for the mission was given on August 22.
Weapons collection would resume early next week, irrespective of events in parliament, Johnson said, adding the mission would not be cut short if the target was reached early.
But the NATO mission faces considerable skepticism or hostility from Macedonians, who believe they have been forced into the peace package and do not think the rebels are handing in all of their weapons or any of their most valuable arms.
Several hundred people gathered outside parliament on Thursday evening, waving bright red and yellow Macedonian flags and banners saying ``NATO and USA --leave Macedonia within 48 hours'' and ``We demand the resignation of the whole government.''
``We have to stay here all night and stop the traitors selling out our country,'' one protester shouted.
Dozens of protesters have also set up roadbloacks at two border crossing points, with the aim of preventing NATO soldiers in neighboring Kosovo from traveling to and from the ethnic Albanian-dominated Yugoslav province.
Blast Rocks School Yard in Macedonia Posted August 29, 2001
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010829/wl/macedonia_544.html
Wednesday August 29 6:06 AM ET
Blast Rocks School Yard in Macedonia
By KATARINA KRATOVAC, Associated Press Writer
SKOPJE, Macedonia (AP) - Police reported a small explosion in an ethnic Albanian part of Skopje on Wednesday as NATO (news - web sites) entered the third day of a mission to collect arms from ethnic Albanian rebels in Macedonia.
The explosion of a small device shortly after midnight in a school yard trash can injured no one, police said. The blast was the third in three days. No one has been injured in the explosions, which all occurred in ethnic Albanian neighborhoods.
NATO officers at Brodec, just northeast of the ethnically tense northern city of Tetovo, said the insurgents were complying with the terms of their agreement with the alliance, which commits them to surrendering thousands of weapons.
On Tuesday, two days into Operation Essential Harvest, hundreds of rebels left hide-outs and streamed into a former mountain stronghold to surrender their weapons. Secretary-General George Robertson was scheduled to inspect weapons assembled so far by NATO on Wednesday.
In exchange for the weapons surrender, the Macedonian government is committed to start debate this week on promised political concessions that would benefit the Albanian minority and permanently defuse the six-month insurgency launched by the National Liberation Army.
Reporters flown to Brodec saw about 100 rebels line up to turn in weapons in the space of two hours. Dozens more were on the move toward the highland village, near the site of several major clashes during past months.
Clad in black or camouflage, some of the rebels smiled and embraced comrades as they arrived at the collection point, a two-story unfinished brick house. The asphalt path to the building was lined by NATO troops. More NATO forces were positioned on surrounding ridges and other strategic areas nearby.
According to the peace plan, the rebel handover of weapons is to be followed by step-by-step political reforms that would first be discussed in parliament once a third of the weapons have been surrendered. That was expected to happen by the end of the week. Lawmakers will vote on the legislation only after all weapons have been collected.
Although NATO expects to gather 3,300 weapons, the Macedonian government insists the true size of the rebel arsenal is some 60,000 pieces. Hard-liners in parliament enraged by the low figure accepted by NATO were expected to stall the debate on reforms.
Defense Minister Vlado Buckovski suggested a second arms collection effort after Operation Essential Harvest ends within a month.
``No one in Macedonia has any illusions that the terrorists have only, say three or five thousand guns,'' Buckovski said Tuesday in urging another arms gathering operation, also with NATO involvement.
Rebel commanders at Brodec insisted their men were complying with the agreement. One of them, who identified himself only as Lluli, expressed relief that the armed struggle for more ethnic Albanian rights appeared to be over.
``I hope the operation goes according to plan,'' Lluli told reporters. ``I want to return to normal life.''
But Macedonians continue to mistrust NATO and fear that if government troops pull back their heavy weapons - as specified in the agreement - they would be left vulnerable to attacks by ethnic Albanians. Some 50 Macedonians blockaded a Tetovo road Tuesday in protest.
Many Macedonians blame NATO for allegedly failing to stop arms smuggling into Macedonia from neighboring Kosovo, considered a major rebel supply route. The neighboring Yugoslav province is under U.N. and NATO control.
Boy gang incited to ambush Nato men Posted August 28, 2001
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,3-2001296336,00.html
TUESDAY AUGUST 28 2001
Boy gang incited to ambush Nato men
FROM MICHAEL EVANS IN SKOPJE
SAPPER Ian Collins, 22 and with two operational tours behind him in Bosnia and Northern Ireland, had barely started his third mission, in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, when a group of Macedonian Slav teenagers threw a large chunk of concrete from a flyover bridge at his Land Rover, smashing through the windscreen and hitting him on the head.
The youths, aged between 14 and 17, ambushed his vehicle as he drove under the bridge crossing the main Skopje to Kumanovo dual carriageway. After the Land Rover had skidded and overturned, they surrounded the Land Rover and further threatened the fatally injured driver and the young captain from his regiment sitting next to him.
The youths appear to have been motivated by some politicians denunciations of Natos role in planning to disarm the ethnic Albanian rebels of only 3,300 weapons.
The attack on Sapper Collins on the outskirts of Skopje happened at 7.15pm on Sunday evening. He had been driving westbound towards the city.
Sima Stojic, an 18-year-old Macedonian Slav living in a house in the hamlet of Magari, where the ambush took place, saw the murder of the young soldier from 9 Parachute Squadron Royal Engineers, based in Aldershot.
Speaking in broken English, learnt during two years in Detroit, the part-time mechanic witnessed the incident while riding home on his scooter. There were about ten of them on the bridge and another five at the side of the road, he said.
Five of them on the bridge were on one side looking out for a military vehicle, the other five were standing ready with a piece of concrete about 1ft long and 9in wide. I saw one of them lift this concrete slab high over his head and then throw it down when the vehicle went under the bridge. It went through the windscreen and another piece went through the window.
The vehicle skidded violently from side to side for about 15 metres and then turned over. It was a dreadful sound. Some of the boys then ran down to where the vehicle was and started to throw stones at it. But soldiers came from other vehicles and they ran off. I know the youths, I know their names.
Pointing to a pile of concrete pieces not far from the roadside, he said: I know the name of the kid who threw the concrete that hit the vehicle. After it happened, they all ran off over the dual carriageway to the other side where the school is. None of them came from Magari.
As soon as Mr Stojic had described what he had seen, a Macedonian policeman approached from the bridge and spoke to him. Within minutes a police car had arrived and he was taken away for questioning. He was released about six hours later. He said that even though it was known where the ambush had taken place the British Army had the precise grid reference no police officer had previously interviewed him or anyone else in Magari.
According to the British military, Sapper Collins and the officer were travelling without any other Nato vehicles. Neither was wearing a helmet or flak-jacket because they were not required to do so. Yesterday Brigadier Barney White-Spunner, commander of 16 Air Assault Brigade who is masterminding the collection of arms from the ethnic Albanian National Liberation Army (NLA), sent out an order for all soldiers travelling in vehicles to wear helmets until further notice.
Major Barry Johnson, the Nato spokesman in Skopje, said that the youth had thrown the piece of concrete with enough malice to kill the British soldier. He admitted that no one could describe the environment in Macedonia as friendly after six months of war and that emotions were running high, particularly among the young, whose actions appeared to be based on the rhetoric they hear.
He said that a passing American military vehicle came to the rescue of the British soldiers. The Americans, who are providing casualty evacuation for Operation Essential Harvest, swiftly arranged for Sapper Collins to be flown by helicopter to Camp Able Sentry, a US base in Kosovo, and then on to the tented hospital at Camp Bondsteel, the main American headquarters in Kosovo. The captain was not injured.
However, the young soldiers head injuries were so serious that it was considered necessary, once he had been scanned, to fly him to Skopje university hospital to be seen by a specialist neurosurgeon. He arrived at the hospital at 11.45pm, 3 hours after the incident, and spent four hours on the operating table. He died at 4.20am yesterday.
The British Armys special investigations branch is helping to investigate the death and is co-operating with the Macedonian police.
Lord Robertson of Port Ellen, the Nato Secretary-General, said in Brussels: I deplore this deliberate act of violence, which is absurd considering Nato troops are in Macedonia to assist the people and the Government in achieving a peaceful and lasting solution to the present crisis.
The death of Sapper Collins overshadowed the first day of Natos arms collection operation, in which the NLA handed over about 400 weapons near the village of Otlja, about ten miles from Kumanovo. In what was described by Nato as a formal ceremony, the NLA placed the weapons in a warehouse before they were counted by alliance troops, identified and packaged for eventual destruction.
A company of about 120 British soldiers from the 2nd Battalion The Parachute Regiment guarded the perimeter of the weapons collection site.
The weapons included 300 assault rifles, 60-80 light machineguns, ten heavy machineguns, up to 15 rocket-launchers and 50 mines
Rebels Line Up in Macedonia to Give NATO More Arms Posted August 28, 2001
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010828/wl/balkans_macedonia_dc_396.html
Tuesday August 28 12:45 PM ET
Rebels Line Up in Macedonia to Give NATO More Arms
By Peter Andrews
BRODEC, Macedonia (Reuters) - Scores of ethnic Albanian rebels in Macedonia lined up Tuesday to hand over weapons to NATO (news - web sites) soldiers on the second day of the alliance's operation aimed at averting civil war in the Balkan state.
Guerrillas ranging from fuzzy-cheeked teenagers to grizzled middle-aged men queued up to surrender their arms to British troops in Brodec, a hamlet just up a twisting mountain road from the rebels' headquarters in the northwestern town of Sipkovica.
The public display was a shot in the arm for NATO's Operation Essential Harvest, which began Monday with rebels dumping their weapons at another collection site in the early hours of the morning to avoid having the operation seen by journalists.
In another boost for peace hopes, a visit by Macedonians to an Orthodox Christian site in territory held by the rebel National Liberation Army (NLA) passed off peacefully.
A NATO spokesman said the alliance was also encouraged by the fact its troops in neighboring Kosovo had detained more than 180 suspected rebels in the past few days as they tried to cross illegally into Serbian province, which is dominated by ethnic Albanians.
``We see this considerable number of detainees here in recent days...confirming our beliefs that the NLA units are disbanding, are turning in their arms -- probably caching them with their brigades -- which are then being turned over to our collection sites,'' Major Barry Johnson said.
GUNS FOR RIGHTS
Under a Western-backed peace deal reached earlier this month, the rebels are to surrender their weapons in return for greater rights for Macedonia's ethnic Albanian minority which they say was the aim of the insurgency they began in February.
NATO's Task Force Harvest 3,300 soldiers in place by Tuesday, Johnson said, about 70 percent of its expected final strength.
Germany looked set to approve the deployment of up to 500 of its soldiers after the opposition Christian Democrats said they no longer planned to block the measure in parliament.
In Brodec, the guerrillas handed in anti-tank weapons, machine-guns and rifles.
Queued up before the front door of a private home, rebels stepped inside one by one to present their arms to British soldiers who examined the wares, registered serial numbers and wrapped them in cloth for removal to a container outside.
NATO officials had no word on the final tally for Tuesday's haul but one said he expected it to be less than the more than 400 weapons gathered on the first day of the mission.
Flak-jacketed British, French and Dutch soldiers stood guard but the atmosphere was relaxed.
The total number of weapons handed in -- and their quality -- -- will come under close scrutiny from leaders of the Macedonian majority, many of whom are deeply skeptical that the rebels will hand in all their arms or any of their best equipment.
Macedonian Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski has described NATO's target of gathering 3,300 weapons in the month-long operation as ``ridiculous and humiliating.''
PEACEFUL PILGRIMAGE
In the current climate, trips such as the pilgrimage by Macedonians Tuesday to celebrate Assumption Day at a revered Orthodox monastery behind rebel lines in the northwestern village of Lesok have plenty of potential for trouble.
But the visit passed off peacefully, despite the fact that feelings were running high among some Macedonians, who fled the area when it came under rebel control after heavy fighting.
The service was held under burning sun. The nearby church where the service should have been held is now little more than a huge pile of rubble, after an explosion last week which Macedonian villagers blame on the rebels.
``Even if this place was crawling with NLA, I would have come,'' a middle-aged woman muttered angrily as she bent to collect a piece of stone from the debris as a memento.
``Damn you non-believers, how could you destroy the house of God? What kind of people are you?''
NLA leaders have denied responsibility for the explosion last Tuesday which destroyed Saint Atanasius Church inside the monastery grounds. Most Albanians are nominally Muslims.
Many Macedonians in the convoy were returning to homes they left months ago during fierce fighting. For most, this was not a permanent return.
Dozens filed down the hill from the village with bags and boxes full of what possessions the rebels left behind.
``We left here a month ago,'' said Radovanka Hristovska, 55. ''Our car was stolen, our house is a mess, there is no way I am staying.''
We'll hand in all our arms: ethnic Albanian rebel leader Posted August 28, 2001
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/010828/1/1diej.htmlTuesday August 28, 6:35 PM
We'll hand in all our arms: ethnic Albanian rebel leader
FRIBOURG, Switzerland, Aug 28 (AFP) - The ethnic Albanian National Liberation Army (NLA) in Macedonia will hand in all its weapons to NATO forces, the group's political leader said in an interview published by a Swiss newspaper on Tuesday.
"We will hand in all our weapons, of all calibres," NLA leader Ali Ahmeti said in the interview, published by the La Liberte newspaper, based in Fribourg.
"We have no reason to conceal how many weapons we have," he said, while saying that estimates of 60,000 arms provided by the Macedonian authorities were a "complete exaggeration."
The interview was published as a NATO force sent to the former Yugoslav republic was in the second day of Operation Essential Harvest, aimed at collecting the NLA's weapons as part of a peace deal.
"I remind you that the figure of 3,300 weapons was arrived at by a committee of experts," Ahmeti told the newspaper, referring to the official number of weapons that NATO says it intends to collect.
The NLA leader, who formerly spent 15 years living in Switzerland, gave the interview by telephone from his base in the northern Macedonian town of Tetovo.
On Monday, the first day of the NATO operation, the alliance said it had collected some 400 weapons.
Ahmati also expressed satisfaction at the peace agreement, signed by the predominantly slav Macedonian government and by ethnic Albanian political parties -- but not by the NLA itself -- in the town of Ohrid.
"We have really signed up for the peace we had been waiting for for a long time," he said.
"With the Ohrid agreement, there is no longer any reason to have a war," he added, saying that the accord had taken on board his group's political platform.
"The fact that we were not physically present in Ohrid was therefore not essential," he said.
On the risk of continuing violence during the arms collection period, he said: "The NLA's soldiers strictly respect all orders from their chief of general staff.
"But it's impossible to avoid spontaneous incidents, which are very few and far between, and cannot threaten the agreement."
Ahmeti also denied that he was fighting for a "Greater Albania", or for a "Greater Kosovo" which would bring together the Serbian province of Kosovo -- currently under UN administration -- and western Macedonia, which is predominantly inhabited by ethnic Albanians.
"We don't want a greater Kosovo," he said. "We Albanians intend to respect the sovereignty and integrity" of Macedonia.
He also said that the NLA did not intend to become "a parallel army" in Macedonia, but that the group would continue to exist until the peace agreement had been implemented.
On a refusal by the Swiss federal government to refuse him the right to return to Switzerland, where his family still resides, Ahmeti said it was "political."
He expressed the hope that the situation would change once peace had returned to Macedonia.
A spokesman for the Swiss federal police confirmed on Tuesday that Ahmeti was still banned from entering the country.
BRITISH SOLDIER'S DEATH THE RESULT OF MACEDONIAN GOVERNMENT Posted August 28, 2001
RADIO FREE EUROPE/RADIO LIBERTY, PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC
___________________________________________________________
RFE/RL NEWSLINE Vol. 5, No. 163, Part II, 28 August 2001
website: http://www.rferl.org/newsline
BRITISH SOLDIER'S DEATH THE RESULT OF MACEDONIAN GOVERNMENT
'HATE CAMPAIGN'? The "Daily Telegraph" reported from Skopje on 28August that "the death of sapper Ian Collins after a mob attack in thesuburbs of Skopje follows a venomous anti-Western campaign orchestratedby hard-line ministers in the Macedonian government." The dailyspecifically mentions Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski and InteriorMinister Ljube Boskovski in this respect (see "RFE/RL Balkan Report," 5June and 24 August 2001). One Macedonian special forces vehicle has"NATO Killers" painted on it. Some individual local people told theBritish reporter that "NATO has done a lot of evil things here" and"we've seen what they've done in Kosovo and Bosnia. They helped theAlbanians and Bosnian Muslims and banished the Serbs. They're playingthe same game here." "The Independent" quoted an unnamed off-dutyMacedonian army captain as saying, "If I saw NATO soldiers here now, Iwould kill all of them myself." PM
MIXED SIGNALS FROM MACEDONIAN AUTHORITIES OVER COLLINS' DEATH Posted August 28, 2001
RADIO FREE EUROPE/RADIO LIBERTY, PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC
___________________________________________________________
RFE/RL NEWSLINE Vol. 5, No. 163, Part II, 28 August 2001
website: http://www.rferl.org/newsline
MIXED SIGNALS FROM MACEDONIAN AUTHORITIES OVER COLLINS' DEATH
In a statement in Skopje on 27 August, Macedonian PresidentBoris Trajkovski condemned the killing of British sapper Ian Collins bya gang of youths (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 27 August 2001), DeutscheWelle's "Monitor" reported. Trajkovski stressed that such violentincidents only help those who want to attain their political goalsthrough violence. He later told British Prime Minister Tony Blair thatthere will be a full investigation, "The Independent" reported.Macedonian government spokesman Antonio Milosovski, however, criticizedNATO for not informing the Macedonian authorities quickly of thekilling, "Monitor" reported. He added that NATO hampered the policeinvestigation by moving Collins' vehicle before police arrived.Milosovski said that it is "too early" to catch the killers. Observersnote that in most cases of violence, the authorities are quick to blameand hunt for "Albanian terrorists" without much of a priorinvestigation. It is not clear why the security forces, whose supportersfeel are capable of crushing an armed insurgency, cannot identify andcatch a group of teenagers. PM
Massacre report names Macedonia interior minister Posted August 27, 2001
http://portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=%2Fnews%2F2001%2F08%2F26%2Fwmace26.xml
Massacre report names Macedonia interior minister
By Jessica Berry in Ljuboten (Filed: 26/08/2001)
MACEDONIA'S hardline interior minister will come under pressure this week to explain his role in the worst alleged atrocity in the six-month conflict with ethnic Albanian rebels, The Telegraph can reveal.
Ljubce Boskovski, an ultra-nationalist and a bitter opponent of the current British-led Nato disarmament mission, will be accused by Human Rights Watch, an American-based pressure group, of involvement in the incident in Ljuboten.
The accusation will be made in a damning report to be submitted to the Macedonian government, but its timing has alarmed some foreign diplomats who fear that Mr Boskovski and his supporters could use it to rail against the West and oppose the Nato mission to collect weapons from the rebels. Operation Essential Harvest, which starts tomorrow, involves 1,900 British soldiers at the head of a total deployment of nearly 5,000 Nato troops.
The Macedonian security operation in Ljuboten two weeks ago left at least 10 ethnic Albanians dead. In a series of interviews last week, villagers described a three-day police operation in which civilians were tortured and shot dead in cold blood.
The government claims that it was hunting down rebels from the National Liberation Army (NLA) after 10 Macedonian soldiers were ambushed and killed and eight servicemen were blown up by land mines.
A tape filmed by Macedonian Television and seen by The Telegraph shows Mr Boskovski standing on the balcony of an empty house above Ljuboten and looking down into the village with other security officers. Houses can be seen burning and there is constant noise of shelling and machinegun fire.
The taped television narrative says: "Ljubce Boskovski was present during the whole operation of the Macedonian security forces."
The interior minister has not replied to requests for comment by The Telegraph, but he told journalists that there had been no massacre of civilians.
Peter Bouckaert, a senior researcher with Human Rights Watch who is writing the report after a series of interviews with witnesses, said, however, that the document would detail a massacre and raise questions about Mr Boskovski's role.
The hardline interior minister controls not only Macedonia's uniformed police force but also, according to diplomats, a renegade crew of paramilitaries known as the Lions.
The Macedonian police claim that the Ljuboten operation was targeting an NLA stronghold, and that eight NLA members were killed and 12 were captured. Villagers, however, gave a dramatically different account to The Sunday last week.
"There were children playing in the street. Suddenly a grenade hit one of the kids. The boy flew in the air and there was smoke and blood. Everyone ran," said Fasli, 25, a farmer.
When he tried to escape on Saturday he reached a checkpoint where, he said, there were "many police, some wearing balaclavas, and dozens of civilians with guns, axes and sticks".
He was then taken to a nearby police station where he and other men were severely beaten by masked policemen. "The carpet was filled with blood," he said.
Outside, Fasli heard a baying mob shouting "Let us kill them. Gas chambers for Shiptars!" Shiptar is a derogatory term for an Albanian.
Elmas, 55, a paraplegic, watched his 33-year-old son, Rami Youssef, die in agony. Unable to move, he could not help him. "They bombed my gate then they came to my house. There were 20 police in my yard." An explosion blew out his front door. This was followed by machinegun fire. He said his son was hit in the side and stomach. "He died very slowly. It took two hours."
Aziz Barami said he saw his son, Suleyman, murdered after they were ordered out of a basement where they had been hiding with other villagers. "They took us through a small gate where there were eight men lying face-down on the ground with their hands above their heads. We were told to lie down too.
" A policeman kicked Suleyman in the head. He was in pain and stood up and then the policeman shot him and then everyone was shooting. I heard one say: `This pig is still moving.' Then there was another single gunshot. Suleyman tried to flee and then they shot him in the head."
UK soldier killed in Macedonia Posted August 27, 2001
http://www.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/europe/08/27/macedonia.harvest/index.html
UK soldier killed in Macedonia
August 27, 2001 Posted: 6:42 AM EDT (1042 GMT)
SKOPJE, Macedonia (CNN) -- A British soldier has been killed in Macedonia after he was hit on the head by a piece of concrete thrown at his vehicle.
The death came as NATO troops prepared to begin their operation to collect weapons from ethnic Albanian rebels on Monday.
Ian Collins, 20, a sapper with the 9 Parachute Squadron Royal Engineers, was driving on the outs kirts of Skopje when the concrete block was thrown by a group of youths just after 7 p.m. local time on Sunday.
He was taken to the U.S. Army base in Macedonia, and then to a U.S. hospital in Kosovo. He was then taken to Skopje University Hospital, where died at 4.20 a.m on Monday.
A second person in the vehicle was uninjured, an Ministry of Defence spokesman said.
CNN's Walter Rodgers said the attack may have been the result of animosity towards NATO troops in the country.
''NATO is deeply resented and seen as having sided with the rebels against the Macedonian people,'' he said.
NATO says it plans to go ahead with Operation Essential Harvest -- its 30-day mission to collect 3,300 weapons from rebels -- despite the death.
"This regrettable incident will not affect the resolve of Task Force Harvest to complete the mission," Brig. Barney White-Spunner said in a statement.
Dren Korabi, a commander of the rebel National Liberation Army, told CNN the NLA was ''very sorry'' to hear about the soldier's death. But he said the operation to hand over arms was going ahead as planned.
Macedonian government officials say NATO's figures for the number of weapons to be collected are unacceptable.
CNN's Rodgers says Macedonian forces have begun pulling back from areas around weapons drop-off sites -- a key requirement for NATO to start collections.
Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski called for renewed attacks against the rebels on Sunday after an explosion destroyed a motel in Celopek, near Macedonia's second city, Tetovo, killing two people. It was unclear who carried out the bombing.
He has called NATO's weapons collection target "ridiculous and humiliating" and says an operation on these terms will fail.
NATO's Major General Gunnar Lange, the mission's military commander, said the number of weapons the NLA had offered to hand over were very close to NATO's own estimates.
"There are no guarantees and the path will not be easy and the alternative is clear," Lange told The Associated Press. "The alternative is war."
In an apparent gesture of goodwill, rebels released eight hostages on Sunday. The International Committee of the Red Cross says it believes 18 others are still being held by the NLA.
Weapons in exchange for reform
The peace deal that ended six months of fighting between rebels and government forces involves rebels handing over weapons to NATO in exchange for political reforms in Macedonia.
One third of the weapons are to be handed over by August 31, when a key parliamentary meeting takes place to launch the procedures called for in the peace plan.
The Macedonian government has said it believes the insurgents have 85,000 weapons, while the rebels had put the number closer to 2,000.
An apparent bomb exploded in a rubbish bin outside a restaurant in a predominantly Albanian neighbourhood on Sunday. No-one was injured and it was not clear who had planted the device.
And just hours before troops were due to open the first arms collection point, state news agency MIA reported heavy exchanges of gunfire east of Tetovo.
British soldier killed in Macedonia Posted August 27, 2001
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/europe/newsid_1510000/1510579.stm
Monday, 27 August, 2001, 08:14 GMT 09:14 UK
British soldier killed in Macedonia
Hundreds of British soldiers have been flying to Macedonia A British soldier serving with the Nato force in Macedonia has been killed near the capital, Skopje - the first casualty among the 3,500 force which has been streaming into the country.
Nato sources say a group of youths threw a lump of concrete at the soldier's vehicle, which crashed.
The incident happened on Sunday evening as the soldier - Sapper Ian Collins of the 9th Parachute Squadron, Royal Engineers - drove the military vehicle on the main road towards Skopje from the airport.
The attack came as Nato troops prepared to begin collecting weapons handed in by ethnic Albanian rebels.
A statement from the Ministry of Defence in London said: "A piece of concrete or similar object came through the windscreen and hit a soldier on the head. He was treated at a military medical unit and transferred to the neurological unit at Skopje hospital and unfortunately died."
The BBC's Nick Thorpe in Skopje says many Macedonians from the majority population resent Nato's arrival, accusing the forces of being biased towards the ethnic Albanian rebels - but he says there is no indication as to who carried out the attack.
Sapper Collins, 20, was taken to hospital, but died there from his injuries, the UK Ministry of Defence said. A second soldier was in the vehicle with him.
Nato sources called it a disgraceful attack.
Weapons collection
Rapid mobile units on the ground, including special forces from several Nato armies backed up by close air support, are expected to be involved in the operation to collect rebel weapons.
Nato commanders insist Operation Essential Harvest go ahead despite the attack.
They say it will result in a meaningful reduction in weapons and is an important step towards disbanding the guerrillas.
However, nationalist elements within the Macedonian Government have dismissed Nato's planned collection of 3,300 weapons, alleging that the rebels possess an arsenal of at least 70,000 arms.
Nationalist Macedonian Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski has described the Nato numbers as "laughable and humiliating for Macedonia."
Nato's most senior commander in Macedonia has rejected accusations that it is a cosmetic exercise, although the alliance has conceded that the National Liberation Army (NLA) rebels could re-arm themselves at any time.
Major General Gunnar Lange insisted that there was no alternative to the plan, except war.
"The turning in of 3,300 weapons plus an additional serious amount of other deadly armaments is not just a gesture," he said
"It is a very real and substantial effort to remove the combat effectiveness of the so-called NLA."
The collection of weapons is a key part of an agreement designed to end months of conflict in the Balkan state.
In return, the Macedonian Government has agreed to various amendments to the constitution that will benefit the country's ethnic Albanian minority.
New demands
However, hours before the operation got under way, the government put forward a new set of demands.
An adviser to Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski told the BBC that security forces expected to be in a position to re-occupy territory held by ethnic Albanian rebels by the end of the operation.
The government also wants to see the swift return of up to 50,000 Macedonians forcibly displaced from their homes, and the release of all prisoners held by the NLA.
Peace efforts threatened
Nato's peace-building efforts have been overshadowed by two bomb blasts on Sunday.
Two Macedonians died in the first explosion in a hotel near the mainly-ethnic Albanian town of Tetovo.
A second outside the Albanian embassy in Skopje on Sunday night is not thought to have claimed any casualties.
State-run radio also reported exchanges of gunfire between security forces and rebels north-east of the capital, Skopje.
Prime Minister Georgievski called for retaliation over the first blast which was blamed on the NLA.
Observers say the attacks prove there are people in Macedonia who are not interested in peace at the moment.
However, the peace process received a boost with the release by rebels of eight prisoners - two soldiers and six civilians, including an American.
Members of the NLA, who say they have been fighting to improve the lot of their ethnic minority, will be granted an amnesty under the deal.
Amendments to the constitution will make Albanian an official language in some areas, and more jobs will be created in the police force and in the public sector for minority groups.
Blast at Macedonian Front as NATO Moves In Posted August 26, 2001
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010826/ts/balkans_macedonia_dc_42.html
Sunday August 26 9:14 AM ET
Blast at Macedonian Front as NATO Moves In
By Mark Heinrich
SKOPJE (Reuters) - A Macedonian motel was blown up Sunday in an area largely dominated by ethnic Albanian rebels, killing two people, as NATO (news - web sites) prepared to start collecting guerrilla weapons under a peace plan menaced by mistrust.
The blast destroyed the Brioni Motel on a front-line riverbank across from the guerrilla-held northwestern town of Celopek. Two men identified as employees were found dead in the rubble and Macedonian state media blamed ``Albanian terrorists.''
With a pivotal session of parliament dedicated to the first batch of bills enhancing Albanian minority rights scheduled for Friday, NATO plans to open arms collection depots Monday even though all 4,500 troops assigned to the mission will not be in theater until next weekend.
NATO needs momentum to allay deep suspicion on both sides.
Macedonia's premier said that if the NATO estimate of guerrilla arms was 3,000 as widely reported but yet to be made public, the arms round-up would be a ludicrous failure and war would resume after alliance troops went home.
``To talk about only 3,000 pieces of weaponry after five or six months of crisis is ridiculous. I believe that the experts from NATO will correct that number,'' Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski said Saturday.
``Without serious disarmament, further fighting is guaranteed,'' said Georgievski, who repeated the figure of 80,000 weapons circulated by Macedonian nationalist hard-liners but rejected by NATO sources as outlandish.
MUTUAL FOREBODING
The Macedonian government suspects the ethnic Albanian guerrillas will be able to hide weapons or replenish their arsenal with impunity via smuggling from Kosovo.
Rebels fear being left helpless against security forces itching for revenge after failing to contain the insurgency, let alone defeat it, and they want NATO troops to stay and police a ``Green Line'' -- something NATO has ruled out.
Wary of ``mission creep'' into another Balkan quagmire, NATO has given its ``Operation Essential Harvest'' mission in Macedonia a limited 30 days to reap guerrilla arms and ammunition -- and only hardware surrendered voluntarily.
All may hinge on whether NATO can stockpile an arsenal impressive enough to persuade the nationalist-led parliament not to renege on peace accord commitments to enact constitutional changes improving the rights of Albanians.
NATO wants to meet the first third of its arms haul target by Friday under a scheme twinning disarmament and legislation in three phases.
The motel blast was the second in five days blamed by Macedonian authorities on ``Albanian terrorists'' on the fluid front lines. A Macedonian agricultural firm owned the motel.
``There was a big explosion at the Brioni Motel just after 6 a.m. (0400 GMT) and it was totally destroyed,'' Shaip Bilalli, police chief for the partly guerrilla-controlled municipality of Tetovo, told Reuters. Celopek is six miles south of Tetovo off the main east-west highway along a column of hills largely controlled by insurgents of the National Liberation Army (NLA).
A Reuters news team on the scene said the building was reduced to rubble except for one wall and part of the roof.
Police investigators had blocked off the site and angry local Macedonians milled about, cursing Albanians and arriving journalists and threatening to go to Skopje to demonstrate before parliament.
The state news agency MIA said the motel had been mined.
Last week, a church inside a revered Macedonian Orthodox monastery in a rebel zone north of Tetovo was dynamited.
FIREPOWER LIST 'LOOKS SERIOUS'
In a counter-thrust to government suspicions, a senior NATO mission officer said he was shown a ``credible'' list of firepower the NLA rebels say they will relinquish.
``There were a lot of weapons (on the list), and if they are given in that is a seriously credible amount of weaponry.''
The list included anti-tank rockets and mortars as well as Kalashnikov assault rifles, a common sight in hills held by the NLA in a crescent running from a few km (miles) north of the capital Skopje to the Tetovo area in the northwest.
``These are the sorts of thing that an organization (which does not want to disband) is going to be extremely reluctant to get rid of,'' the NATO officer said.
Georgievski's caustic comments reflected the ethnic polarization afflicting Macedonia that ominously resembles the downward spiral to war and dismemberment of fellow Yugoslav republic Bosnia a decade ago.
NATO brushed aside Georgievski's criticism.
``That has not been presented as the official response to NATO from the government,'' NATO spokesman Major Barry Johnson said. ``We have every confidence this is moving forward and that weapons collection will begin Monday as planned.''
The senior NATO officer conceded it would be impossible to collect all weapons at the disposal of the NLA, given porous borders with Kosovo and Albania and the inveterate smuggling in the mafia-ridden economies of the Balkans.
As if to underline that sober insight, NATO-led KFOR peacekeepers in Kosovo fought and captured five suspected ethnic Albanian insurgents and detained 48 more crossing the border from Macedonia Friday.
A KFOR spokesman said it could not be ruled out that the guerrillas may have been trying to bring weapons back into Kosovo to keep them out of the hands of NATO collectors.
NATO insists its latest Balkan mandate, after more ambitious peace enforcement missions in Bosnia and Kosovo that now look indefinite, will help create a foundation for peace.
The government says tens of thousands of refugees must be able to return home safely and state sovereignty reinstated in rebel zones in order for NATO's mission to be judged a success.
NATO enters a well-armed land Posted August 26, 2001
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/238/nation/NATO_enters_a_well_armed_land+.shtml
NATO enters a well-armed land
Smuggling bolsters Macedonian rebels
By Charles M. Sennott, Globe Staff, 8/26/2001
NEAR TETOVO, Macedonia - Meet Commander Leka, a battalion chief of the ethnic Albanian rebels who control this area.
He wears a camouflage uniform with the signature red patch of the Albanian National Liberation Army. An AK-47 assault rifle is slung over his shoulder and his ammunition vest bulges with two full clips of bullets, two 9mm semiautomatic pistols, and a hand grenade.
As NATO's latest mission in the Balkans begins tomorrow with a voluntary collection of rebel weapons - a move intended to stop a war here before it starts - Leka says with a smile that he and the roughly 2,000-member NLA will hand over their arsenal and ''comply 100 percent.''
Then Commander Leka, who goes only by his nom de guerre, reached for a hip holster and unsheathed an 18-inch knife with a bone handle which he describes as his favorite weapon, adding, ''But I don't ever give up my knife.''
The limited NATO mission with a self-imposed deadline of 30 days is, to its supporters, a noble effort to derail another runaway conflict in the Balkans. To its critics, this is a hopelessly naive endeavor destined to fail.
Even the most senior planners of the operation acknowledge that NATO can never stop the easy flow of weapons to rebel forces along the mountainous borders of Kosovo and Albania.
According to analysts and diplomats, the region is awash in weapons. A report released in April by the International Crisis Group, a policy organization that attempts to prevent conflict, cites weapons estimates for Macedonia, Albania, and Kosovo of 280,000 Kalashnikov rifles, 1 million antitank missiles, 3.1 million hand grenades, 1 billion rounds of ammunition, and 24 million machine guns.
Jane's Defense Weekly confirmed in report Friday that ''the NLA has a very secure supply line to western Macedonia'' of weapons which include surface-to-air missiles, 120mm mortars, rocket-propelled grenade launchers, and antitank rockets. The publication also estimates that the NLA has 3,000 fighters and perhaps an equal number of volunteers who are not in uniform but mostly have access to weapons.
An array of defense specialists as well as NATO and Macedonian defense officials interviewed by the Globe last week confirm that even if NATO succeeds in collecting the rebels' weapons, the NLA could rearm in a matter of weeks or even days should it decide that the political process is not achieving its demands for constitutional changes that guarantee rights for ethnic Albanians.
Commander Leka and others know there are a variety of sources and trade routes into Macedonia.
The primary route is through Albania, where hundreds of thousands of weapons were looted from Albanian Army depots in 1997 and where criminal gangs conduct a flourishing market in the weapons trade.
Weapons have also continued to flow over a criss-crossing mountain paths from Kosovo into Macedonia, especially through the areas of Radusa and Vesala, according to a high-ranking official in the Macedonian defense department.
Macedonian officials claim that NATO's interdiction efforts - which were stepped up in June as part of a US-led mission known as ''Operation Eagle'' - along the Kosovo border have been largely unsuccessful in stemming the flow of weapons that fueled the fighting in Macedonia in July and early August.
This is one of the reasons the Macedonian government has been skeptical of the NATO mission, and one of the reasons why the American forces have a low profile in ''Operation Essential Harvest.'' There are only about 300 American soldiers involved in this NATO operation, which is deploying more than 4,000 troops. British soldiers have taken the lead role.
NATO officials argue that their interdiction efforts have been successful, and that increased patrols along the Kosovo border in recent months have brought in 2,000 weapons and tens of thousands of rounds of ammunition as well as the arrest of several arms dealers.
There have been reports in recent days of NLA weapons flowing in the other direction - out of Macedonia and into Kosovo. NATO has confirmed some of these reports, and specialists theorize that the moves are an attempt by the NLA to hide its best weapons before the NATO mission begins.
Another trail of weapons to the Albanian rebels in Macedonia comes from truck convoys into the country from neighboring Bulgaria, according to Jane's Defense Weekly.
Sometimes, the greed of arms dealers even rises above the seething ethnic hatreds in this region. Jane's also cites reports of weapons sales to Albanian rebels from Serbia. Corrupt officials in the Zastava arms factory in Serbia have made black market deals with rebels, says Jane's.
Commander Leka agrees. And to prove it, he handed his assault rifle across a table to show its unmistakable stamp: ''Made in Zastava.''
''The Serbs give us better prices than our brothers the Albanians,'' he said. ''If the Macedonian government does not live up to the agreement, we can get more weapons. When we started this we had to get weapons, and if we need to continue it we will just get more.''
The large supply of weapons has pushed prices down, and the rebels are backed by wealthy Albanian nationalists in the region and around the world, including the United States. Kalashnikov assault rifles, for example, go for about $150, according to Leka. Mortars can be had for a fraction of that price.
Still, NATO officials insist that the success or failure of Operation Essential Harvest will be defined by whether it can build enough confidence to help the Macedonian government and the rebels to move toward a political solution. At their daily press briefings, NATO officials acknowledge that their presence here is also about ''building confidence.''
Colonel Paul Edwards, NATO's chief of the operation, said yesterday, ''No one is going to remove every weapon in this region.''
''I come back to our position that'' the rebels' offer to disarm ''is a statement of intent'' that they seek to pursue their goals in the political process and not through fighting.
''The collection process is but one part of a process heading toward peace,'' he added.
NATO will collect weapons at about 15 sites in three regions. Officials have pledged to collect one-third of the rebels' weapons by Friday, when the Macedonian Parliament is expected to introduce legislation to change its constitution and local laws to guarantee the rights of ethnic Albanians, who make up roughly 30 percent of Macedonia's 2 million citizens.
The Macedonians are skeptical of the weapons hand-over. They say they want a real end to the hostilities, and many dismiss the NATO mission as a charade that benefits the alliance's public affairs department but does little to solve the issues behind the conflict.
It is not clear that the bill would pass in Parliament.
Fighting broke out along Macedonia's border with the Serbian province of Kosovo in February, after ethnic Albanians launched an insurgency, announcing they were fighting for greater rights. Hard-liners in the government say ethnic Albanians have their eyes on a state of their own.
After an Aug. 13 peace agreement was forged and a fragile cease-fire seemed to be taking hold, NATO's ruling council authorized a total of about 4,700 troops to help with disarmament of the rebels. That includes about 3,500 actively involved in the collection of arms and others in administrative and logistical roles, the alliance said Friday.
By far the most explosive issue surrounding this operation, and one that presents the possibility that it could collapse, is the widely differing assessment of how many weapons the NLA actually has.
The NLA has said that it has 2,500 weapons. The more moderate elements of the Macedonian government have said the rebels have no fewer than 8,500, and hard-liners have trotted out a number of 85,000. NATO officials balked yesterday at publicizing the number that they say they have come up with, but do not deny published reports that it is ''more than 3,000.'' Yesterday Macedonia's prime minister, Lupco Georgievski, said that figure is far too low, dismissing it as ''ridiculous.''
Ed Joseph, an American analyst for the International Crisis Group, said, ''Weapons equal time.''
''By collecting weapons, NATO can slow everything down and give the political process time to move forward,'' he said. ''If they can delay the momentum toward a war here until the fall, that means something.''
Autumn in the Balkans brings raw weather and difficult fighting conditions. But yesterday as the NATO forces braced for their new mission the muggy heat of late summer still lingered over the region.
This story ran on page A1 of the Boston Globe on 8/26/2001.
NATO mission on hold as Macedonia security cabinet meets Posted August 26, 2001
http://asia.dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/world/article.html?s=asia/headlines/010826/world/afp/NATO_mission_on_hold_as_Macedonia_security_cabinet_meets.html
Sunday, August 26 8:05 PM SGT
NATO mission on hold as Macedonia security cabinet meets
SKOPJE, Aug 26 (AFP) -
NATO's mission to collect ethnic Albanian rebel weapons looked in danger of being delayed on Sunday as talks between alliance and government officials on the number of arms to be gathered continued.
And with less than 24 hours to go before the planned launch of Operation Essential Harvest, two security guards were killed in an explosion that destroyed a motel in the northwest, an AFP journalist at the scene said.
An emergency session of Macedonia's national security body was called on Sunday to discuss developments, including both NATO's estimate on how many rebel arms it will collect over the next 30 days and the blast.
NATO says it is ready to launch its mission but its spokesman appeared less confident it would begin as planned.
"We are preparing to conduct the mission tomorrow, but we are flexible on when to start," said Major Barry Johnson, the alliance's spokesman in Skopje.
Other military officials were convinced an agreement would be reached later on Sunday.
According to reports from alliance and government sources, big differences in figures have to bridged. NATO sources say around 3,300 arms is a fair number, while Macedonian tallies have ranged from 6,000 to 85,000.
On Saturday, Macedonian Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski, a nationalist, described NATO's estimations as "laughable", saying that the guerrillas had 70,000 pieces of weaponry.
Whatever the figure, NATO is committed to gathering one third of them from the National Liberation Army (NLA) by Friday, when parliament meets to debate implementing a wider accord reached on August 13 by political leaders.
Operation Essential Harvest also depends on a shaky July 5 ceasefire holding out.
While northern Macedonia has been largely calm since NATO ambassadors decided to launch the mission on Wednesday, a massive explosion on Sunday near the mainly ethnic Albanian town of Tetovo heightened tensions again.
An AFP journalist at the scene said there had been unconfirmed reports that two security guards at a motel near Celopek were bound with wire and tied to explosives.
The journalist said the blast destroyed a restaurant and lodging complex in what residents of Celopek, which has a mixed Macedonian and ethnic Albanian population, described as the act of animals.
The residents said they feared for their safety and blamed the Macedonian security forces for not doing enough to protect them. Police from Skopje were sent to the scene to try to determine if the blast was a criminal act or the work of rebels.
Its timing appeared calculated to derail the start of the NATO mission, which is part of a wider peace accord granting an amnesty to rebels who surrender their weapons and changing the constitutional to give the Albanian language official status in some areas.
Ethnic Albanians make up around a quarter of Macedonia's population of two-million, in which Slavs are in the majority.
Macedonian PM calls for military action after motel blast Posted August 26, 2001
http://asia.dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/world/article.html?s=asia/headlines/010826/world/afp/Macedonian_PM_calls_for_military_action_after_motel_blast.html
Sunday, August 26 10:37 PM SGT
Macedonian PM calls for military action after motel blast
SKOPJE, Aug 26 (AFP) -
Macedonian Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski called for military action on Sunday after two security guards were killed in a blast that destroyed a motel near the northwest village of Celopek.
Speaking to journalists after taking part in a Macedonian security cabinet meeting, Georgievski said: "I can say the barbarian behaviour of the terrorists after Lesok is continuing. Today we have Celopek and Macedonia has to react with the military or with police."
On Tuesday, a 14th century Orthodox church was blown up in the village of Lesok near the mainly ethnic Albanian town of Tetovo.
Unconfirmed reports said the Macedonian Slav security guards in Celopek had been bound with wire and explosives had been tied to them.
Georgievski also said he opposed withdrawing the military from the northwest unless the ethnic Albanian rebels of the National Liberation Army (NLA) retreated to positions they held when a ceasefire was signed in early July.
"I am absolutely against withdrawing heavy artillery from military positions before we agree that the terrorists (NLA) should return to positions that they held on July 5," he said.
According to NATO, the army had promised to take its heavy weapons and tanks back to barracks while the NLA said it would move back with its weapons from the road linking Tetovo to the town of Jazince.
The area around Celopek is not controlled by NLA rebels but they have nevertheless made frequent incursions into it.
Celopek is also the birth-place of hardline Macedonian Interior Minister Ljube Boskovski.
The blast came as discussions resumed in Skopje between NATO and government officials over how many weapons the guerrillas should hand over for destruction during the alliance's arms collection mission in the troubled country.
According to well-informed sources, quoted by local media, the two sides reached an impasse late Saturday after a heated debate during which Skopje's negotiators raised the possibility of suspending NATO's Operation Essential Harvest, due to begin on Monday.
But NATO officials said Sunday that they were confident of reaching an agreement over the number of arms to be collected.
NATO is reported to believe that a figure proposed by the NLA of around 3,300 is credible.
Georgievski, a nationalist, rebuffed the estimations once again on Sunday, describing them as "laughable and humiliating for Macedonia".
NATO Seeks 3,300 Rebel Guns, Macedonia Says Too Few Posted August 26, 2001
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010826/wl/balkans_macedonia_dc_384.html
Sunday August 26 4:05 PM ET
NATO Seeks 3,300 Rebel Guns, Macedonia Says Too Few
By Mark Heinrich
SKOPJE (Reuters) - NATO (news - web sites) said on Sunday it would collect 3,300 weapons from ethnic Albanian guerrillas under a peace plan in Macedonia, despite government concern that the alliance has dangerously underestimated the rebel arsenal.
``There is no formal agreement on these figures,'' said Major General Gunnar Lange, commander of 4,500 NATO troops assigned to disarm the rebels voluntarily, referring to tension with the government over the scope of the mission.
Government objections to NATO's assessment of guerrilla firepower delayed a formal announcement of the disarmament target by two days, raising doubts whether ``Operation Essential Harvest'' would swing into action on Monday as planned.
But Lange said the operation would now proceed on time.
He said the rebels had agreed to yield more than 2,950 assault rifles, 210 machineguns, 130 mortars and anti-tank weapons, six air-defense systems, and two tanks and two armored personnel carriers captured from the Macedonian army.
More than 600 mines and hand grenades, 1,100 rounds of mortar ammunition and 110,000 small-arms rounds would also be turned in at the 15 weapons collection depots, he said.
``The numbers are very close to our own estimates as to what we believe they have, but it is their figure and of course we cannot verify it,'' the Danish general said.
``We do believe, however, that once (the weapons are) collected and destroyed, the so-called NLA (National Liberation Army) will effectively have been disarmed ... and disbanded.''
HURDLES
Success may hinge on whether NATO can collect an arsenal impressive enough to persuade the nationalist-led parliament not to renege on commitments made in a peace accord to enact constitutional changes improving the rights of Albanians.
Parliament convenes on Friday, the front lines are still prone to violence, including the demolition on Sunday of a Macedonian motel by suspected Albanian extremists that killed two people, and NATO desperately needs momentum.
Efforts to reassure a skeptical public that the West will do more than implement a cosmetic peace were bolstered on Sunday by the release of eight Macedonian prisoners held by the NLA. But 18 more are registered missing by the International Committee of the Red Cross, to whose staff the freed men were handed over.
The government suspects the guerrillas will be able to hide weapons or replenish their arsenal with impunity via smuggling from Kosovo, where their separatist kin predominate.
The rebels fear being left helpless against security forces itching for revenge after failing to crush the insurgency. They want NATO to stay and police a ``Green Line,'' which it rules out.
Western diplomats had indicated earlier that the Macedonian army was being slow to withdraw artillery and tanks from front lines to help defuse hairtrigger tension.
A senior government official said later ``misunderstandings have been cleared up'' and NATO arms collectors could start work on Tuesday at the latest, though Skopje believed NATO had seriously underestimated the arsenal targeted for removal.
Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski, a nationalist hard-liner in a government split between hawks and moderates, said NATO's widely reported estimate of somewhat over 3,000 guerrilla weapons was ``ridiculous and humiliating'' to Macedonia.
But the senior official said the National Security Council ''concluded today, despite Georgievski's objections, that the NATO operation should go ahead because it would be unserious for us to stop it with NATO troops having already arrived.''
NATO has given its troops exactly 30 days to gather guerrilla arms and ammunition surrendered voluntarily.
It wants to meet the first third of its arms haul target by Friday under a scheme twinning disarmament and new legislation.
MOTEL BLOWN UP ON FRONT LINE
The Brioni restaurant-motel, in rebel-dominated territory about 33 miles west of Skopje, blew up on Sunday morning and the bodies of two men were pulled from the rubble.
State news agency MIA said the motel had been mined and it blamed ``Albanian terrorists.''
Front lines in the area are indistinct. Security forces rarely show their face by day for fear of ambush from the rebel-held town of Celopek across the river.
Prime Minister Georgievski's comments reflected the ethnic divisions in Macedonia that resemble the descent to war and dismemberment of fellow Yugoslav republic Bosnia a decade ago.
The senior NATO officer conceded it would be impossible to collect all weapons available to the NLA, given porous borders with Kosovo and Albania and the inveterate smuggling in the mafia-ridden economies of the Balkans.
NATO-led KFOR peacekeepers in Kosovo fought and captured five suspected ethnic Albanian insurgents on Friday and detained 77 crossing the border on Friday and Saturday. A KFOR spokesman said some of the guerrillas may have been trying to bring weapons back into Kosovo to avoid having to hand them in.
NATO says its mission will help create a basis for peace. The government says it can be judged a success only if tens of thousands of refugees are able to return home safely and state control is restored in rebel zones.
Macedonia Rebels Say Are Disbanding Posted August 25, 2001
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010825/wl/macedonia_rebels_1.html
Saturday August 25 11:08 AM ET
Macedonia Rebels Say Are Disbanding
By ELENA BECATOROS, Associated Press Writer
NIKUSTAK, Macedonia (AP) - Smoking and chatting, about 50 ethnic Albanian rebels - some still in their camouflage uniforms, others already in civilian clothes - waited for their commander to sign their demobilization papers.
The insurgents, who took up arms in February and thrust this ethnically divided Balkan nation to the brink of civil war, said they had already begun disbanding and planned Saturday to begin preparations to hand over weapons ahead of a NATO (news - web sites) mission to collect and destroy their arms.
``We are going to show the world that we are for peace,'' their commander, a top rebel leader known simply as Adashi, told The Associated Press on Friday.
Adashi commands the rebel 114th Brigade that covers the capital, Skopje, and outlying areas such as Aracinovo, site of some of the heaviest fighting of the six-month-long insurgency. But now, he said, he's committed to dismantling his forces.
``The 114th Brigade isn't going to have any more soldiers,'' he insisted outside his headquarters in Nikustak, a village about 10 miles northeast of the capital, where most buildings bear the scars of shelling and rubble covers the main street.
``When all is finished, we want our fighters to have an everyday normal life like other citizens,'' Adashi said.
Although he refused to allow photographs, he said the disbanding had already begun and rebel leaders planned on Saturday to begin preparations to hand over their weapons to British-led NATO troops in an operation to begin next week.
On Friday, the NATO commander in Skopje, Gen. Gunnar Lange, said both rebel and government forces would begin pulling back from areas where NATO will set up weapons collection sites to give alliance troops some ``breathing space.''
But not everyone is convinced that the rebel National Liberation Army will abide by the agreement. Many Macedonians fear the insurgents' newer and more sophisticated weapons will be hidden in the hills or smuggled over the border to Albania and Kosovo and stashed away there in case they're needed again.
NATO repeatedly has said that its forces will not search for or confiscate any weapons, collecting only those to be handed in voluntarily.
NATO officials said Friday that they and the rebels had arrived at a mutually acceptable figure of weapons to be surrendered. Neither side revealed what the figure was, but Western diplomats speaking on condition of anonymity put it at 3,000, slightly higher than the rebels' initial claim of 2,000 arms. The Macedonian government has insisted the militants have as many as 85,000 weapons.
Adashi, a former officer in the Macedonian army, admitted that every gun won't be handed in. Some fighters may keep small arms for personal protection, he said.
``There will not be a single weapon here, except for a very low number - perhaps one percent - of pistols, which will be kept,'' he said.
It remained unclear whether the arms to be surrendered include at least two tanks and two armored personnel carriers captured by the NLA from Macedonian security forces. The rebels have said in the past that they will not hand in the vehicles but will destroy them instead.
NATO's 30-day mission is tentatively scheduled to begin Monday. By the end of next week, a third of the weapons should be in NATO's hands, Lange said.
In a divided village, ethnic hatreds grow amid Balkan cease-fire Posted August 25, 2001
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/237/nation/In_a_divided_village_ethnic_hatreds_grow_amid_Balkan_cease_fire+.shtml
In a divided village, ethnic hatreds grow amid Balkan cease-fire
By Charles M. Sennott, Globe Staff, 8/25/2001
EPROSHTINA, Macedonia - A bus rumbled yesterday down the dirt road that cuts this ethnically divided village in half and dropped off several dozen Macedonian families displaced by the fighting earlier this summer.
It was the first time the Macedonian Slavs were able to return to see what was left of their homes - burned, looted, and, in some cases, reduced to rubble.
Reina Zafirovski, 55, broke down when she saw the place where she raised her four children.
''Everything is gone! Where are we supposed to go? What do we do?'' she said, collapsing on the threshold of the charred frame of her house and sobbing.
Her home, and most of the homes of her extended family and neighbors in the Slavic side of this Macedonian village, were destroyed, presumably by Albanian rebel forces.
The rebels attacked in retaliation for an earlier shelling by the Macedonian military on the ethnic Albanians who live on the other side of the main road.
This rural village, where Macedonians and ethnic Albanians once lived together as neighbors, stands as the latest example of simmering ethnic hatreds, deep mistrust, and bitter divisions left over from fighting that flared in July and early August before a shaky cease-fire was announced Aug. 13.
It is a stark illustration of the difficulties that lie ahead for NATO forces as they set out on a mission to collect weapons and try to stop the momentum toward another ethnic conflict in the Balkans.
NATO forces and international monitors escorted some 500 Macedonians to a string of villages in the hills northeast of Tetovo that are now under the firm control of the rebels of the Albanian National Liberation Army. It was the first time the residents, who were brought in a convoy of four buses, had been able to return to the area since July, when intense fighting broke out and prompted many of the Macedonian families to flee.
The cease-fire was violated here Thursday night when Macedonian paramilitaries positioned across a hillside in the village of Reiyeh strafed Albanian homes with gunfire. NATO sources said it was one of the most dramatic violations of the cease-fire in the past four days and a glimpse of the quagmire that they face in Macedonia.
Both sides of the divided town stress the crimes committed by the other, and ignore the brutality that their side commits.
The ethnic Albanians, who are overwhelmingly Muslim, pointed to the dome of their mosque, which was punched by a mortar shell on Sunday. They showed the burned barns, the houses damaged by mortar shells and helicopter strikes. A sign hanging from a tree read, ''Beware Snipers!''
The Macedonians, who are predominantly Orthodox Christians, pointed to the nearby 13th-century monastery of Lesok, where their church was bombed earlier this week. They walked through their ravaged homes and wept and shouted angrily.
The Macedonian families, many of whom came here with the hope of staying, left several hours later clutching what belongings they could find, shaken by the realization that they may never return.
A group of Albanian neighbors who live less than 75 yards away from the Zafirovsky family watched Reina's agony from a street corner. They did nothing to help her.
An Albanian father and son returning from the fields walked past her and looked away as she gathered what was left from a heap of her family's belongings in the front yard.
''We can never live with them again,'' she said, nodding to the Albanian side.
The ethnic Albanians say that they have lived for too long without equal rights in Macedonia and that the country will never return to calm until their rights are guaranteed.
The National Liberation Army, which before the fighting had no more than a few hundred members, now has a membership well into the thousands, observers here estimate.
The Albanians, who make up about 25 percent of Macedonia's 2 million residents, have been emboldened by the fighting. They expect that the Macedonian government will amend the constitution, guaranteeing them equal rights and recognizing Albanian as an official language of the country.
''If the political process goes forward, we will not have a war,'' said Elias Islami, 52, an ethnic Albanian farmer whose cattle sheds have been destroyed by Macedonian paramilitary bombing. ''If it does not, then war is inevitable. ... I didn't used to support the [National Liberation Army], but now I support them all the way.''
NATO commanders have set a 30-day deadline for carrying out their weapons collection mission, although exactly how many weapons they expect to collect beginning next week is unclear.
Diplomatic sources said NATO officials had set a target of slightly more than 3,000 weapons to collect from the rebels, who had said they had 2,500. But the figure was far lower than the government's estimates of between 8,000 and 80,000 weapons.
This story ran on page A10 of the Boston Globe on 8/25/2001.