STOP NATO: �NO PASARAN! - HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --------------------------- ListBot Sponsor -------------------------- Start Your Own FREE Email List at http://www.listbot.com/links/joinlb ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -Ethnic Albanian rebels withdrew...under the NATO plan. Alliance peacekeepers [sic] used NATO trucks to drive rebel weapons past Macedonian government lines. Buses ferried the rebels to safety. -In Tetovo, police officials... said rebels attacked police positions on the outskirts of the city....The rebels also attacked a police position near the city stadium.... -EU foreign ministers told Macedonian Foreign Minister Ilinka Mitreva...not to count on any new foreign aid unless the government and ethnic Albanian opponents settle their differences. -[M]ore than 100,000 have fled their besieged towns, with more than 65,000 seeking refuge in the Yugoslav province of Kosovo... June 26, 2001 Political Fallout in Macedonia by KONSTANTIN TESTORIDES Associated Press Writer SKOPJE, Macedonia (AP) -- Political fallout intensified Tuesday following a day of rioting in Macedonia's capital that was touched off after Americans and other NATO troops evacuate armed ethnic Albanian rebels from a besieged town. Monday's riots came despite international efforts to stop a full-scale war between ethnic Albanians and majority Slavs. The riots came after NATO-led peacekeepers intervened in the conflict for the first time, part of a deal designed to end fighting in Aracinovo, a suburb on the outskirts of Skopje. While the evacuation was the first U.S. involvement in the Macedonian conflict, American troops have been stationed in Macedonia since former President Clinton sent them as part of a U.N. peacekeeping operation in 1993. Ethnic Albanian militants withdrew from the suburb under the NATO plan. Alliance peacekeepers used NATO trucks to drive rebel weapons past Macedonian government lines. Buses ferried the rebels to safety. The withdrawal outraged thousands of Macedonian Slavs, who gathered outside parliament Monday evening demanding harsher action against the rebels. Shots were fired, but there were no reports of injuries. Police reservists were called in and the riot broke up after they were ordered to pull back. The attack shattered a cease-fire meant to create conditions for peace talks to end Macedonia's most severe crisis ever. With tensions still on high and fresh riots near the country's second-largest city, Tetovo, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw postponed a visit to Skopje. He was expected to hold talks with political leaders from both sides who are increasingly estranged after the peace talks collapsed in disarray. Such dialogue is likely to become harder to arrange, with both ethnic Albanian and Macedonian Slav leaders facing more pressure from their constituencies. On Monday, some protesters broke into the legislature and shattered windows. Photographs of European Union officials trying to end the crisis were burned in the streets. Western intervention of all kinds becoming increasingly unpopular among Macedonian Slav hard-liners. Straw said it would have been inappropriate to go ahead with his planned visit while Macedonian ministers were preoccupied with trying to calm the situation on the ground. ''I intend to go there as soon as the situation becomes calmer,'' he said. The European Union's new envoy for Macedonia, meanwhile, consulted with EU ministers Tuesday before beginning his mission to Skopje. EU officials said former French Defense Minister Francois Leotard would leave ''very soon'' for Macedonia after the talks. In Tetovo, police officials who spoke on condition they not be named said rebels attacked police positions on the outskirts of the city and that government forces returned fire. The rebels also attacked a police position near the city stadium, a military spokesman said. There were no reports of injury. The violence is likely to place more pressure on President Boris Trajkovski, who has been trying to revive peace talks. He scheduled a televised nationwide address for later Tuesday. The lack of progress has dismayed EU leaders, who have been trying for months to persuade the Macedonian Slav leadership and ethnic Albanian political leaders to compromise and avert civil war. To back up that point, EU foreign ministers told Macedonian Foreign Minister Ilinka Mitreva on Monday during talks in Luxembourg not to count on new financial aid unless the government and ethnic Albanian opponents settle their differences. Trajkovski has appealed to all political leaders to return to the bargaining table to reconsider his peace plan. The plan calls for amnesty for most rebels who disarm voluntarily and greater inclusion of ethnic Albanians in state bodies and institutions. Ethnic Albanian parties are seeking more rights under the constitution. Macedonian Slav parties reject that as a threat to the nation's survival. Fighting broke out in Macedonia in February, when militants began taking over villages near the border with Kosovo -- whose population is predominantly ethnic Albanian -- to demand more rights. Since then, more than 100,000 people have fled their besieged towns, with more than 65,000 seeking refuge in the Yugoslav province of Kosovo alone, a statement issued Tuesday by the Geneva headquarters of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees said. � __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get personalized email addresses from Yahoo! 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