New Regional Crisis Hot-Spot in the Balkan?

Macedonia as the Destiny

Do individuals in certain American and European agencies believe that the problem involving Albanian extremists can be resolved only if they are permitted to create Greater Albania? Perhaps not formally and institutionally, but in the manner which would enable various war lords to snatch the territories they “claim” and then prolong resolution of their status to eternity

AIM Belgrade, March 20, 2001

What will happen to the region still remains to be seen, but all those who claim that the destiny of the Republic of Macedonia is not at stake in Tetovo shares the responsibility for premeditated murder with robbery. Well-armed, comparatively well-dressed, with a war experience, Albanian extremists have started their war in the north-western part of this state. If in Kosovo the armed rebellion is the result of long repression and segregation pursued by the regime of Slobodan Milosevic, in Macedonia it is a direct attempt to achieve the maximalistic ethnic project. The manner in which it is to be prevented is neither simple nor quick, a lot must be cut off at the roots, many stereotypes must be given up, and time is relentlessly passing.

Kosovo is at the very heart of the problem. Partly because of the feeling of alliance from the time of NATO intervention and, later, the pressure against former president of FR Yugoslavia Slobodan Milosevic, and partly simply because of its impotence, KFOR has failed to disarm and prevent operation of extremist groups that the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) consisted of. In order to preserve power, position, privileges, criminal business deals and everything else due to which Kosovo is the least safe part of Europe, extremist commanders, practically undisturbed and stopping at nothing, continued with the expansion. Provoking the crisis in Presevo valley was nothing but the introduction to bloodshed in western Macedonia: the buffer zone inside the three municipalities of southern Serbia served just to distract the attention of the world media and to test the relevant parts of the international community. When they determined that the European Union and the USA do not know what to do with the Albanian issue, that national contingents that form KFOR are concerned only about their own safety, extremist commanders ordered shooting at Tetovo to begin. And had the new administration in Belgrade repeated Milosevic's method of resolving ethnic conflicts, from their standpoint the situation would have been perfect. But even as it is it seems that they are not concerned much whether they will overnight instead of the “good” guys become “bad”.

And here is why. When a month ago near Merdar, Albanian extremists blew up a bus of Nisekspres (at least ten dead passengers of Serb ethnic origin) they wished to send two messages with this crime. First – multi-ethnic Kosovo is completely out of the question, and second – if KFOR or UNMIK decide to oppose them, their members can easily be attacked too. The only real answer should be uncompromising anti-terrorist operation. But, multinational forces have no will for anything of the kind: it is by far a lesser problem to explain how the former allies suddenly transformed into terrorists than to actually face them and get involved in a long-term military-police-political operation which is highly risky, without any guarantees of success and without a clear vision of how and when all that will end.

The extremists – still – dictate the course of political life. They abolish the law and all security. The citizens are intimated, the politicians disqualified. Twenty odd sinister characters with Kalashyikov machineguns and a recoilless gun are worth more than two hundred thousand votes. Links with suspicious persons from all sorts of bureaucratic services preoccupied with their own scheming and careerist intrigues, are more significant that the entire international diplomacy. Local war lords with their armies have become the persons with whom “deals are struck”. And violence and hatred generate violence and hatred, indefinitely...

That the violence and lawlessness would spill over from Kosovo into Macedonia was clear for years. Surrounded by neighbours who have for the past hundred years denied it and aspired to its territory, Macedonia is the only former republic of SFRY which won independence without ethnic conflicts and war. The greatest merit for that goes to Macedonia's first president Kiro Gligorov. After his second term in office had expired, the region lost its only world-sized politician, and Skopje started making a series of irresponsible and ill-considered moves. The independent Macedonian state did set out with a whole spectre of problems characteristic of transition and the wars in the neighbourhood that the authorities did not cope with adequately. But everything that followed with the current cabinet of Ljupce Georgijevski may now seem as if done with the only one intention – to prove that Macedonia is not capable of surviving as a serious state. First, Gligorov's policy of an equal distance to the neighbouring states was silently abandoned for the sake of winning daily political points, charging large commissions, and to put it mildly, the Bulgaria-loving policy of the ruling VMRO. Then scandalously Macedonia recognised Taiwan, and instead of getting sacks full of dollars promised by Vasil Tupurkovski, it was deprived of a thousand and two hundred soldiers of the United Nations deployed in Macedonia in order to prevent conflicts before they even broke out and not as customary by arriving in the field only after shooting becomes serious and when it is too late. Beijing broke off diplomatic relations with Skopje and voted against the continuation of the UN mission in the Security Council. After NATO intervention in FR Yugoslavia, Georgijevski officially received Hashim Thaci – one of the commanders of the KLA – as the prime minister of the self-proclaimed government of Kosovo... Was the motive winning cheap popularity among the Albanian ethnic population or toadying the former American administration? The result, whatever it may have been, was degradation of serious and responsible Albanian politicians and stirring up of the ambitions of those similar to Thaci.

A whole series of these and other moves raised the question of credibility of the Macedonian state. And that is something Albanian extremists were waiting for. The presence of NATO was not in any way a discouraging factor – is not ethnic violence and organised crime flourishing in Kosovo, are not extremists recruited and their bases organised right in front of the noses of thousands of members of KFOR? The anarchy there for the simple reason of self-preservation had to spill over into Macedonia. If that is clear, the main question that arises is whether perhaps individuals in powerful American and European agencies believe that the problem with extremists can be resolved only by letting them create Greater Albania? Perhaps not formally and institutionally, but by enabling war lord to snatch the territories they “claim” and then prolong resolution of their status to eternity. Is that the background of the bloodshed in western Macedonia which nobody bothered to find even the flimsiest immediate cause for?

Despite everything, Macedonia must survive independent and in its present borders, and it will. Although noone in one's right mind would deny the existence of ethnic hatred, it is a fact that in this state all ethnic communities participated in executing power and that there is a firm model of joint life. Why is the conflict provoked if minority rights are guaranteed in Macedonia? They have secondary and elementary schools in their mother tongue, they participate in local and state administration and they have their media: television and press.

The extremists, like everywhere, despite their ethnic romanticism, do not enjoy significant social support and they are holding out by the spiral of violence and intimidation. Although the Ministry of the interior and the Army of the Republic of Macedonia are neither especially well equipped nor numerous, they are quite sufficient to stop them on their territory. Nevertheless, after the current bloodshed – even if it ends immediately – nothing will be the same in Macedonia. That is why it is much more important to overcome fear and distrust of the Macedonian and the Albanian community. This will require exceptional skill, good will, patience and – as the most important of all – that the international community give up on its fine talk and finally do its job in Kosovo. On the contrary, the model of operation of anarchy there and its extremist protagonists will not devastate just Macedonia, but also much larger, richer and better organised states.

Philip Schwarm

(AIM)