[ALBSA-Info] U.S. Diplomat Arrives in Macedonia

[Gazhebo at aol.com]

U.S. Diplomat Arrives in Macedonia

By KONSTANTIN TESTORIDES
  
SKOPJE, Macedonia (AP) - An American diplomat landed in Macedonia on Sunday 
and called on political leaders to work harder to end a conflict with ethnic 
Albanian rebels who have reportedly seized new villages and forced Slav 
civilians out. 

``It is important to recognize that finding a solution here is really the 
responsibility of the leaders of Macedonia,'' special envoy James Pardew told 
reporters after his arrival, which raised the Bush administration's stake in 
the troubled Balkan country. 

``Those who favor use of force here are undermining the peace process,'' he 
said. 

Pardew, the State Department's European Bureau special adviser, will be 
working with a European Union envoy to jump-start peace negotiations between 
the rebels and the Slav-dominated government. Persistent skirmishes and 
reports of rebels driving civilians from villages suggest their mission will 
be difficult. 

A state radio report said the rebels took control of four villages near tiny 
Macedonia's second largest city, Tetovo, and ordered Macedonian Slavs to 
leave. 

Vase Zakovski, a resident of one of the villages, Setole, told an Associated 
Press reporter in Skopje that he left after ``three armed and masked people 
... told me to get out of the village.'' 

A Human Rights Watch team met a convoy of about 50 villagers who said armed 
rebels forced them out of Setole and another village, Otunje, said Peter 
Bouckaert, an official with the rights organization. They said a larger group 
had left a day earlier. 

``Certainly we are concerned that Macedonian civilians in this area where 
physically threatened,'' Bouckaert said. ``One of the Macedonians told me he 
had had a gun pointed at him and was told to leave the village yesterday.'' 

Deputy Interior Minister Refat Elmazi, an ethnic Albanian, told The 
Associated Press he had heard reports that rebels were in the communities in 
recent days but had not heard of threats to civilians. Monitors with the 
Organization for Security and Cooperation were trying to get to the area to 
check the reports. 

Police officials said a 58-year-old civilian male was shot to death recently 
in one of the villages, Brezno. About a dozen civilians have been killed in 
Macedonia's conflict since the ethnic Albanian rebels took up arms in 
February. 

The government also reported a soldier killed and another wounded, both by 
rebel mortar fire in separate attacks in the north of the country. The 
government also said its troops had come under fire in the village of 
Tanusevci from the Kosovo side of the border. 

Army spokesman Col. Blagoja Markovski said the region near Tetovo, about 25 
miles west of Skopje, was ``relatively calm'' overnight, but that there was 
occasional sniper fire from outlying villages. 

Markovski also said there were sporadic exchanges of small arms fire that 
lasted into early Sunday near Kumanovo, about 20 miles northeast of Skopje. 
He said the fighting began when rebels opened fire from several cars. 

The second day of low-level fighting came after a lull that lasted several 
days. Clashes were reported Saturday near the Kosovo border in the north. 
Most of the fighting has taken place in the northwestern portion of the 
Vermont-sized nation. 

Pardew did not single out specific leaders when he condemned hard-liners. The 
EU has warned Macedonia that further aid could be suspended if its Slavs and 
ethnic Albanians fail to bridge their differences. 

The rebels have demanded constitutional changes to guarantee ethnic 
Albanians, who make up for about a third of the population of 2 million, 
equal status with the Slav majority. 

The government says it fears that would eventually lead to the division of 
the country along ethnic lines, and claims the rebels intend to carve off 
parts Macedonia and ultimately create a new nation linking ethnic Albanians 
in Macedonia, Albania and Kosovo.