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NATO Troops Pour into Macedonia for Disarmament Mission
SKOPJE, Aug 23 (News Agencies) - Hundreds of NATO troops moved into Macedonia on Thursday on a mission to collect and destroy weapons held by Albanian soldiers amid uncertainty over the willingness of the fighters to give up their arms.
Ninety British soldiers disembarked at Skopje airport at 9:00 am (0700 GMT) and were being followed by a further 460 British troops Thursday in a total of seven flights, a NATO spokeswoman said.
She said an Italian contingent was also due later and possibly soldiers from the Netherlands, but that troops from Greece were now expected on Friday for a force, known as "Operation Essential Harvest", that will total 3,500.
NATO, the Macedonian government and the National Liberation Army (NLA) were still negotiating on Thursday how many thousands of weapons would have to be surrendered.
Even if the NLA does hand over a substantial number, Skopje fears the NLA could easily rearm, and NATO has admitted that new weapons are easy to find.
On Wednesday, the head of the NATO task force, Major General Gunnar Lange said the alliance-led peacekeeping force in neighboring Kosovo, KFOR, had seized thousands of arms in the last two months.
Speaking at a press conference in Skopje, Lange said KFOR had intercepted 672 rifles, 60 support weapons, 1,060 anti-tank weapons, 113 rocket missiles, 1,499 grenades and mines, and that 530 people had been detained.
"Numbers and figures are very important, but we are in a region where they can rearm, can find new weapons, so it is a lot more important that the trust and confidence and the implementation of the political agreement give them no wish to rearm and start fighting again," he said.
Operation Essential Harvest was planned to coincide with an August 13th accord between Muslim Albanian and Macedonian Slav political leaders to end the uprising that began in February for more minority rights.
The agreement included an amnesty for the NLA, which has prompted them to give up their weapons, and constitutional changes that would make Albanian an official language in certain areas and provide more minority jobs.
NATO has given itself 30 days to collect and destroy the NLA's weapons and uniforms and is believed to be working to an initial deadline of August 31st to gather one third of the arms.
The Macedonian government has said the NLA would have to hand over 6,000 to 8,000 light weapons, while the interior ministry, notoriously more hardline, quoted the figure of 85,000, which differs greatly from all other estimates.
In an exclusive interview with AFP on Wednesday, President Boris Trajkovski backed away from mentioning any figures.
Various Western officials have suggested the number could be anywhere from 2,300 to 3,000.
The other major concern for NATO is whether the shaky ceasefire agreed between the two sides on July 5th will be respected.
In the 24 hours before alliance leaders gave the mission the green light on Wednesday and since then, few incidents have been reported.
Tuesday night was one of the calmest in north and northwest Macedonia in recent weeks, and army spokesman Blagoja Markovski said that only minor incidents had been reported overnight Wednesday.
Markovski said Albanian soldiers in the northern NLA stronghold of Kumanovo shot at security forces from the village of Ropajce and that the fire was returned.
A short burst of machine gun fire was also heard near an army checkpoint in the village of Vaksince, but Macedonian soldiers did not respond, the Macedonian source added.
On Thursday, EU Balkans envoy Francois Leotard visited a 14th century Orthodox church that had been blown up in what Skopje described as a "serious provocation".
Leotard, who was the first Western official to visit the site, made no statement about the blast, for which no one has claimed responsibility.
Earlier in the month, on August 8th, a mosque in the town of Prilep was looted and burned.
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