Macedonia gets EU backing to quell rebellion before it embroils the entire region
Macedonia's army launched an offensive yesterday against Albanian rebels in the hills above the embattled town of Tetovo after Skopje won EU backing for a military response to end the rebellion by ethnic Albanian "terrorists".
Plumes of smoke rose from around rebel positions and columns of earth were thrown up as the army opened an artillery barrage against the insurgents, marking a new intensity in Macedonia's struggle to quell the rebellion before it embroils the entire region in a new Balkans war.
Army cannon opened rapid fire at 4 p.m. and within half an hour a heavy pall of thick grey smoke hung across the entire hillside to the north and north-west of the town.
Several isolated houses on the edge of the north-western town had been hit by shells, including one from which rebels had been firing on police positions.
The pounding lasted around 90 minutes before dying away to spattered bursts of machinegun fire.
Witnesses said groups of rebels could be seen coming from the hills only 300 or 400 metres from the town stadium where the special police units were backed by the army units.
The army had massed tanks and troops in Tetovo for an offensive to drive out the rebels after special police armed with mortars and machineguns had struggled in vain for seven days to chase the rebels from the edge of the large town.
Speaking against the constant background of pounding shells, Mr Arben Xhaferi, leader of the Democratic Party of Albania (DPA), said he was angry that his party, which forms part of the governing coalition, had not been consulted before the attack began.
But he insisted he would not pull his party out of the coalition as yet.
"Right now we have a very very deep need to be part of the government," he said.
The army opened up with its heavy weapons just hours after the EU's foreign policy supremo, Mr Javier Solana, gave Skopje the union's blessing to use "proportional" military force against the "terrorists".
"Let me say clearly it is a mistake to negotiate with terrorists. To negotiate with terrorists in this particular case is a mistake . . . and we will not recommend that," Mr Solana said after talks with Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski.
The Macedonian leader swore the government "will not negotiate under the threat of terrorism and ethnically-motivated extremism which are claiming victims".
"Macedonia has enough power to settle the accounts with extremists by itself," he warned.
Several hours later the army, which had until now been confined to blasting rebel-held villages on the rugged border with Kosovo, started pounding the hills around Tetovo.
The guerrillas claim to be fighting for the rights of Macedonia's large Albanian minority. But Skopje says it has declared itself open to reform and accuses the rebels of trying to carve up the country and annex Albanian areas to Kosovo, which is more than 90 per cent Albanian.
The self-styled National Liberation Army (NLA) warned earlier it was losing patience with the government.
"Due to the ignorant attitude of the Macedonian authorities and their naive and hypocritical ignoring of the Albanian demands we are losing patience," the rebels said in a statement.
As Macedonia launched the assault to root out the guerrillas, diplomatic efforts accelerated to form a political firewall around Macedonia's coalition government, which includes a key Albanian party.
The Albanian Foreign Minister, Mr Paskal Milo, hailed the "self-restraint of the Macedonian authorities" in the face of attacks by Albanian rebels.
The Russian Foreign Minister, Mr Igor Ivanov, arrived in Skopje from Belgrade, where he insisted the international community should set up a "firm obstacle to terrorist aggression" in Macedonia and southern Serbia if "a new explosion in the Balkans" was to be avoided.
World leaders from the UN Secretary General, Mr Kofi Annan, to President Bush have slammed the "extremists" for trying to tip the region into ethnic war, and international security and rights groups mobilised representatives to rush to Skopje.
The conflict has displaced thousands of people from the north-west, aid agencies said.
Paris announced that France and Britain are shortly to submit a resolution on the crisis in Macedonia to the UN Security Council, which is expected to pledge support for Macedonia.