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NATO Troops Act And May Allow Yugoslav Forces In Macedonia
SKOPJE, March 6 (News Agencies) - NATO peacekeepers moved against ethnic Albanian separatists operating along the Kosovo-Macedonia Tuesday, as international concern continued to grow that the conflict could destabilize the whole region.
NATO is also considering allowing Yugoslav forces into Macedonia to help quell mounting unrest.
As Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski vowed to drive out the gunmen fighting his troops, KFOR peacekeepers arrested six suspected fighters in the U.N.-administered Yugoslav province of Kosovo.
They included one in a black uniform who had apparently been spying on their positions.
Earlier Tuesday, a further 150 U.S. peacekeepers were sent to the border area as fighting flared up.
In Skopje meanwhile, Trajkovski told parliament: "We will not negotiate with terrorist, militarist elements who spread racial and ethnic hatred."
He was speaking just days after three of his troops were killed in the northern conflict zone.
As sporadic fighting died down Tuesday in heavy snowfall, Trajkovski vowed to stamp out the conflict before it could spread from the isolated mountains to Skopje, just 40 kilometers (25 miles) to the south.
"No inch of Macedonian territory will be ceded to extremism and terrorism," he added.
KFOR officers monitoring the border said Tuesday there were between 75 and 150 gunmen, a mix of Kosovo and Macedonian Albanians, armed with assault rifles, machineguns and rocket launchers.
The NATO force has agreed to work more closely with Macedonia to combat the menace after Skopje last week criticized KFOR's lack of vigilance in the border area.
International support for Macedonia's bid to isolate the violence continued to grow Tuesday.
The gunmen's month-long occupation of the northern village of Tanusevci has raised fears of a renewed Balkans conflict dragging into neighboring Yugoslavia with NATO-led troops trying to control chronic ethnic violence in Kosovo.
Bulgaria, Croatia, France, Germany, Greece, Romania, Slovenia and Turkey expressed support for Skopje and condemnation of the gunmen.
The European Union and OSCE pan-European security body also weighed in against the separatists.
Albanian leaders in both Macedonia and Kosovo have condemned their "extremist" actions, as did Albanian Prime Minister Ilir Meta at a press conference in Paris on Monday.
Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic said Tuesday "terrorists" in southern Serbia and Macedonia were working together to win control of the main highway running through the area, which links the central and southern Balkans to Europe.
That squares with NATO's view that the two groups are probably linked, motivated by both Albanian nationalism and organized crime, mainly gun running and drug trafficking.
The National Liberation Army (UCK) in Macedonia is thought to be linked to the much larger group fighting Serbian forces in a nearby demilitarized buffer zone on Kosovo's boundary with southern Serbia.
Skopje said there were also signs the unrest could be spreading after 176 women and children fled the village of Goshince, just a few kilometers from Tanusevci, for a majority Albanian village near Skopje.
A similar exodus last month preceded the outbreak of fighting in Tanusevci.
The gunmen say they are fighting for the rights of Macedonia's ethnic Albanian minority, who they say are treated as second-class citizens.
In 1998 war broke out in neighboring Kosovo between the Kosovo Liberation Army - also called UCK in Albanian - and Serbian forces, leading to NATO intervention and Kosovo's de facto independence from Serbia.
Skopje says Albanians make up a quarter of its two million people, but many Albanians put the figure at closer to a third.
Macedonia's Foreign Minister Srdjan Kerim set off on a round of diplomatic talks, beginning with the U.N. Security Council, which was expected to hold an emergency session on the Macedonia crisis on Wednesday.
Kerim was also to meet with NATO officials in Brussels.
The international community has cautioned Macedonia against using excessive force in dealing with the gunmen, fearing an overreaction could spark wider discontent among Albanians and drag the whole region into fresh conflict.
Meanwhile, NATO is studying the possibility of allowing Yugoslav forces into the troubled border area between Kosovo and Macedonia, NATO Secretary General George Robertson said here Tuesday.
"We are looking very closely now at the possible decision to allow Yugoslav forces into the ground safety zone along the border," he told reporters.
"I hope a decision will be taken this week," he added.
Robertson was speaking after a private meeting with U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan on the crisis along the Kosovo-Macedonia frontier. Earlier in the day, he had briefed members of the U.N. Security Council.
"NATO is determined that the ground safety area will not be used as a safe haven for extremists," Robertson said, adding that the NATO-led force in Kosovo, KFOR, would act robustly to tighten border security.
He promised "more troops, more patrols and more activity to restrict the use of Kosovo as a reinforcement area for those who are causing the trouble and the tension in northern Macedonia".
Robertson said he had been in frequent contact over the weekend with Trajkovski, the Macedconian president.
"NATO supports the security and stability and the territorial integrity of the former Yugoslav republic of Macedonia," Robertson said.
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