Stone-Throwing Crowd Dispersed; Fighting in Major City Threatens Cease-Fire
By John Ward Anderson
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, July 25, 2001; Page A16
SKOPJE, Macedonia, July 24 -- Hundreds of Macedonians, angry at what they
call Western appeasement of ethnic Albanian rebels, attacked the U.S. Embassy
and other Western missions and businesses here tonight. The violence occurred as
fighting between rebels and government forces surged again in and around a major
city west of the capital. About 200 protesters approached the U.S. Embassy around 11 p.m. throwing
stones that broke a few windows, an embassy spokeswoman said. She added that
government security forces dispersed the crowd without injuries. As a
precaution, the U.S. government ordered evacuation of family members and some
embassy personnel and urged U.S. citizens to curtail travel to Macedonia. The British and German missions, as well as a McDonald's restaurant and the
office of British Airways, were hit in similar attacks. Cars were torched at the
offices of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). A military barracks in the ethnic Albanian-majority Tetovo city west of the
capital was also attacked. The fighting threatened to sweep away entirely a
fragile cease-fire that went into effect July 5. Many analysts said it was all
that was keeping the country from descending into full-scale warfare between the
minority ethnic Albanians and majority Macedonians. The Reuters news agency quoted a rebel commander as saying his forces might
try to seize Tetovo. That would be a major escalation in the five-month
conflict, which has taken place mostly in rural areas. International observers said that contrary to initial reports of two dead and
about 30 wounded in battles Sunday and Monday, as many as 30 people were killed
in the first two days' fighting. In Tearce, about eight miles north of Tetovo, ethnic Albanian rebels held
four OSCE officials hostage for more than three hours, and demanded that the
International Committee of the Red Cross treat wounded rebels as a condition of
releasing the hostages. They were later freed, sources said. The observers said the rebels were also preventing a convoy of vehicles with
Macedonian residents from leaving the village. During the cease-fire, political talks aimed at fashioning a package of
political, economic and cultural reforms to enhance the rights of ethnic
Albanians, who Western official say make up about a third of the country's
population, became deadlocked over a proposal to make Albanian a second official
language. Government officials are particularly angry that the rebels have used the
19-day-old cease-fire, which was brokered by NATO, to reinforce their military
positions and expand the area under their control. "If the terrorists do not withdraw to their positions of July 5, we will have
no option left but an offensive by Macedonian security forces to restore the
previous situation," Defense Minister Vlado Buckovski said Monday. Today, the government's chief spokesman, Antonio Milosovski, accused NATO
countries of directing the ethnic Albanian rebel group with the goal of making
Macedonia an international protectorate. "NATO is not our enemy, but it is a
great friend of our enemies who are attacking the future of our country," he
told Reuters. Western diplomats denied the allegation. "There is an atmosphere of paranoia
and nationalistic hysteria in some circles of the leadership," one diplomat
said. "Negotiating a settlement in this type of extreme and intense political
and security environment is not feasible. The environment is too hostile." "The government spokesman is screaming about NATO and OSCE aiding their
enemies," he added. "It's very ominous." Foreign officials said emotions were being fired up by erroneous media
reports that NATO helicopters from the neighboring Serbian province of Kosovo,
which allied troops patrol on a peacekeeping mission, were resupplying rebel
units in Macedonia. Another report said an OSCE vehicle had fired on a
Macedonian police post. Western officials denied the reports, but they apparently are accepted by
many Macedonians. Tetovo and Skopje were calm early in the day, bringing some hope that
international mediators could restore the cease-fire and lure political leaders
back to negotiations that have been stalled since last Wednesday, when the
ethnic Albanian representatives walked out. But heavy gunfire erupted in the
city later in the day. In the early afternoon, a group of about 150 Macedonians launched a protest
outside the parliament building in Skopje, complaining that the government had
not responded when ethnic Albanian rebels had forced them from their homes in
villages outside of Tetovo. The protest quickly became violent. Later, other
groups attacked Western targets in the capital.
