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You're right, Kosta, what a surprise!
I see the OSCE/CIA have even backdated the
non-existent paramilitaries a year so as to suggest
that Commander Hoxha and his KLA contras are only
acting - we all saw it coming - in self-defence.
And of course Washington-based Human Rights Watch - a
State Department operation pure and simple, if not
entirely acknowledged yet - is playing their
indispensible role also.
Does it all sound distressingly familiar? It should.
It's a shoddy remake of Kosovo: The Humanitarian War.
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>
> Macedonia Paramilitary Threat Emerges
> By COLLEEN BARRY
> .c The Associated Press
>
> SKOPJE, Macedonia (AP) - Pamphlets emblazoned with a
> lion symbolizing a group
> calling itself Paramilitary 2000 delivered a
> powerful threat to ethnic
> Albanian shopkeepers: Close shop or we'll burn down
> your businesses.
>
> Most stall owners in and around the trash-strewn
> industrial wasteland called
> Madzari packed up and left after receiving the
> threat 10 days ago from the
> recently activated paramilitary group, which
> considers some Albanians who
> arrived in the last few years illegal residents of
> Macedonia.
>
> The emergence of paramilitary threats in the
> capital, Skopje - a direct
> response to the insurgents' assault on neighboring
> Aracinovo and evident in
> riots outside Parliament last week - brings a new
> escalation to Macedonia's
> conflict between ethnic Albanian militants and
> government troops in this
> troubled Balkan country.
>
> Immediately following the threat, rebel Commander
> Hoxha announced that his
> forces in the hills surrounding the capital were
> prepared to defend Albanians
> in Skopje if they came under attack. That spread
> unease among the Slav
> population.
>
> The Albanian businessmen of the Madzari district say
> they have been menaced
> by a black jeep with the Paramilitary 2000 logo, but
> so far there have been
> no direct confrontations or violence. But they also
> say Macedonian police
> have refused to protect them.
>
> ``The police said that all Albanians who work here
> should remove their stock
> and leave the area,'' shopowner Ibrahim Baftjari
> said. He has remained, but
> has removed his most expensive goods.
>
> Since the threat, up to 30,000 Albanians, mostly
> from Skopje, have left for
> Kosovo, bringing the number of refugees who have
> taken refuge in the Serbian
> province to 100,000 since the insurgency began four
> months ago.
>
> It is a pattern that has repeated itself in more
> than a decade of Balkan
> conflicts: Irregular units form in response to
> dissatisfaction with military
> and police action against an insurgency.
>
> Western observers worry that the slightest spark - a
> slain policeman or
> Macedonian Slav civilian - could lead to full-blown
> civil war.
>
> They cite not only the new irregular units but also
> the vast number of armed
> reservists. Already, reservists were blamed last
> week by President Boris
> Trajkovski for bringing the country to the brink of
> civil war when, massed
> outside Parliament, they opened fire amid a crowd of
> Macedonian Slavs enraged
> at the rebels' safe passage from Aracinovo under
> U.S. escort.
>
> ``There's a coalescence of different extremist
> elements into more formal
> networks,'' said Peter Bouckaert of Human Rights
> Watch. ``We're talking about
> a region where there's a pattern of civilians
> involved in conflicts.''
>
> The government denies the existence of any irregular
> paramilitary
> organization in Macedonia. Off the record, a
> government source dismissed the
> Paramilitary 2000 as ``a bunch of drunks who number
> no more than 20 people,''
> and estimated the total number of paramilitary
> fighters at ``no more than
> 200.''
>
> The real threat, the source said, is from reservists
> who have been issued
> arms by the Interior Ministry, like those outside
> Parliament last week. Not
> all the guns were given to people on the reservist
> list, the source said, and
> some were distributed specifically to members of the
> ruling government party.
>
> But bigger questions remain: Who controls these
> armed militias and
> reservists, and how much crossover exists between
> them?
>
> So far, very little is known about who comprises the
> newly emerging armed
> groups. In a communique two weeks ago, Paramilitary
> 2000 said its 2,000
> fighters included members of Army special forces
> units - the Tigers, the
> Wolves and the Scorpions - as well as mercenaries.
>
> There are other groups operating as well, including
> the National Front of
> Macedonia and the Todor Aleksandrov, named for a
> 20th-century patriot, as
> well as clubs of football hooligans boasting
> paramilitary structures.
>
> Following a pattern some fear will spread to Skopje
> and other cities, Western
> and government sources say police officers were
> among gangs that destroyed
> Albanian businesses and targeted the homes of
> prominent Albanians in Bitola
> in May after four policemen from the southern city
> were killed. The home of
> the deputy health minister, Muharrem Nexhipi, an
> ethnic Albanian, was among
> those targeted.
>
> Deputy Interior Minister Refet Elmazi, who is an
> ethnic Albanian, says
> neither the prime minister nor the interior
> ministers - both Slavs -
> expressed condolences, adding: ``I guess that speaks
> a lot.''
>
> Polarization has already spread through government.
> Elmazi said recent events
> have made it difficult for him to perform his
> government role. Interior
> Minister Ljube Boskovski refused to give him details
> of the reservist
> call-up, including how many arms were distributed.
>
> ``It is important for the second person in the
> police to know what is
> happening,'' Elmazi said. ``As deputy minister of
> the interior, I can tell
> you the Macedonians are playing a very secret game.
> They are not sharing
> information with other parties.''
>
> AP-NY-07-03-01 0117EDT
>
>
>
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