[AMCC-News] Macedonia: Albanians Welcome New Look Police

[Mentor Cana]

http://www.iwpr.net/index.pl?archive/bcr3/bcr3_200302_408_4_eng.txt

Macedonia: Albanians Welcome New Look Police

A big increase of ethnic Albanians in the Macedonian police appears to be
encouraging trust between the rival communities.

By Mustafa Hajrulahi in Skopje (BCR No 408, 20-Feb-03)

You could be forgiven for giving the scene a double take - Albanians in
Macedonia's trouble spots meeting policemen and chatting cordially over a
cup of coffee.

It would have seemed unthinkable two years ago, when Albanians battled for
six months to improve their civil rights. The fighting stopped in August
2001 when the western-sponsored Ohrid agreement undertook to give the
community a greater say in their own affairs.

Part of the accord was to enlist about 1,000 Albanians and other minorities
into the police force, which had previously been overwhelmingly manned by
officers from the Macedonian majority.

Training of Albanian recruits, at the police centre in Idrizvo near Skopje,
is proceeding at a rapid pace. The interior ministry organises three
courses a year in conjunction with the Office for Security and Cooperation
in Europe, the OSCE.

About 500 minority recruits were trained in 2000 and 600 more should be
ready by July 2003.

The campaign has already started bearing fruit with the introduction of
mixed patrols, each consisting of three Macedonians and three Albanians, in
areas dominated by the latter.

Nazmi Mailqi, a senior academic at the Southeast Europe University in
Tetovo, said police used to treat minorities in an overbearing manner, and
the inclusion of Albanians in the police and the interior ministry was a
step in the right direction.

"Participation of Albanians in police patrols. is a precondition for
regaining lost trust," he told IWPR, although he believes more should be
done to increase the community's representation in the senior ranks of the
police and the army.

Interior ministry spokesperson Mirjana Kontevska said its four advertising
campaigns for police recruitment of minorities between September 2001 and
December 2002 had elicited more than 1000 applications, 80 per cent of them
from the Albanian community.

Before the crisis in 2001, Albanians accounted for only about seven per
cent of the police force - it is estimated the proportion will rise to 20
per cent.

In October 2001, police started returning to western parts of Macedonia
where they'd previously been reluctant to go. "The Albanian presence in the
patrols has improved the cooperation of the local population," said Orce
Todorovski, an ethnic Macedonian a policeman in a mixed unit at Rasce
police station, which covers a number of Skopje municipalities.

His Albanian colleague, Nexhati Idrizi, said, "Police disdain and
maltreatment of the local population before and during the 2001 conflict
led to mistrust among the Albanians. Relations are much better now and if
police continue to treat the population well things will improve even
further."

Idrizi said that upon their arrival in western villages, mixed patrols are
usually greeted warmly by Albanian residents, "We meet the villagers, have
coffee with them and discuss everyday problems. The locals seem eager to
talk to us and I think that this is an important step towards rebuilding
trust."

Femi Bajrami, a resident of the village of Radusa, commented, " People here
have accepted the patrols without any problem. This is obvious from the
fact that they can move around here freely day and night."

OSCE representative Wolfgang Greven said the new look patrols have gone
down well in a number of villages. "Some residents even demand more
frequent patrols," he said. Greven placed great importance on the chats
over coffee and other friendly exchanges, "I believe it signals a return to
trust in the police."

Muhamed Osmani, the commander of Rasce police station, told IWPR that the
police are now viewed not as part of the problem but as part of the
solution.

Mustafa Hajrulahi is an Albanian journalist.