The UN war crimes chief prosecutor will examine a Macedonian request for an investigation into the alleged killing of 12 Macedonians during the ethnic Albanian insurgency this year, a spokeswoman said today.
Ms Carla del Ponte, chief prosecutor at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugosalvia (ICTY), will study a letter from Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski requesting an investigation into information on about 12 during the seven-month conflict.
Mr Trajkovski said earlier in Skopje he had asked Ms del Ponte to probe anonymous information received by Macedonian courts that the 12 who disappeared during the conflict had been killed by ethnic Albanians and buried in a common grave near a village called Neprosteno in the northwest of Macedonia.
Ms del Ponte had not yet established whether war crimes within The Hague tribunal's jurisdiction had been committed in Macedonia, the spokeswoman said.
She said the court was still collecting information. Ms del Ponte would decide on the basis of the conclusions of these preliminary enquiries whether a full investigation should be opened into war crimes in Macedonia.
Under an August peace accord, the ethnic Albanian National Liberation Army in Macedonia agreed to end its insurgency and handed in almost 4,000 weapons to NATO troops last month in exchange for promised reforms to boost the rights of ethnic Albanians.
AFP