Macedonia resumes peace debate, NATO ponders future
( 2001-09-04 10:12 ) (7 )

Macedonian legislators resumed debate on reforms crucial to peace with ethnic Albanians on Monday as Western officials hinted that NATO, now collecting guerrilla weapons, may need to consider a future security role.

A NATO spokesman agreed that a serious security vacuum looms in Macedonia after the alliance winds up its 30-day gathering of rebel arms later this month. He said NATO governments were considering how to stabilise the ex-Yugoslav republic thereafter.

Another NATO official said alliance governments were looking into ways of protecting a future mission of several hundred Western civilians who would monitor compliance with a peace deal vulnerable to violent radicals on both sides.

Parliament had been silenced for two days by its hardline nationalist speaker Stojan Andov, who alleged that Albanian guerrillas were intimidating civilians, and demanded guarantees that all displaced Macedonians would return home soon.

NATO, European Union and US envoys co-sponsoring the peace process said Andov's demands must wait until rebels had been disarmed and parliament reciprocated by ratifying better civil rights for Macedonia's large ethnic Albanian minority.

Andov relented after Albanians ended a roadblock protest against alleged police harassment that had stranded a convoy of 350 Macedonians trying to visit homes behind rebel truce lines.

Parliament reconvened shortly before midday (1000 GMT) and most backbenchers who took the podium blasted the accord as a dangerous sop to Albanian separatists.

President Boris Trajkovski and Branko Crvenkovski, head of the main moderate party in a shaky ruling coalition with nationalist hawks, both urged the assembly on Friday to ratify the reforms or risk plunging Macedonia into ruinous civil war.

POSITIVE FIRST VOTE LIKELY

Although most deputies distrust guerrilla intentions, most are expected to vote on Tuesday or Wednesday to initiate the process of changing the constitution to make it compatible with the peace pact, Western diplomatic sponsors say.

But they concede that nationalists who argue Macedonians are being stripped of their birthright at guerrilla gunpoint may hold up the second and final stages of the agenda + drafting the amendments followed by a ratification vote.

The insurgents have begun disarming as their part of a bargain that promises ethnic Albanians greater civil rights to be enacted by parliament by the end of September.

At a Macedonian army base on Monday, NATO displayed 1,210 weapons collected so far out of its target haul of 3,300. A NATO spokesman said 80 percent of the weapons were in good condition, 15 percent could be used if repaired and the rest were junk.

"As from today we will start to destroy these weapons. They will be crushed, cut up and removed for smelting down at another location," British Major Alexander Dick told reporters. NATO had already begun blowing up mortar bombs, mines and ammunition.

NATO troops began last week to gather in arms and ammunition voluntarily surrendered by National Liberation Army insurgents. But Dick said there would be no more collections until parliament voted to authorise a rewrite of the constitution.

NATO does not want to get drawn into peacekeeping in Macedonia because it is already mired in two costly, open-ended security missions in post-war Bosnia and Kosovo.

But no one has any illusions that animosity and distrust still smouldering between Macedonians and Albanians will evaporate in a mere 30 days of NATO presence after six months of bloodshed that killed scores of people and displaced 140,000.

Analysts warn Macedonia will remain a powderkeg without a longer NATO presence, citing Skopje's conviction that rebels are hiding guns with impunity and threats to have police hunt down every alleged armed Albanian despite an amnesty pledge.

NATO TO BE AROUND LONGER IN SOME FORM

The US special envoy to Macedonia and Britain's defence minister hinted on Monday that NATO may have to consider a role protecting a larger mission of civilian monitors led by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

"(OSCE) countries who may be called upon to contribute monitors want increased security in sensitive areas," US envoy James Pardew said before meeting OSCE leaders in Vienna.

"Local security forces have ultimate responsibility for security (in their country). But the question is whether local forces in Macedonia can secure that responsibility adequately (so soon) after a conflict of this nature," he told Reuters.

"Now, NATO has no mandate in Macedonia for anything but voluntary collections of weapons at this point. I'm not pushing an agenda here. But security after disarmament is an issue being raised as we try to raise the number of monitors."

In Brussels, NATO spokesman Yves Brodeur said the alliance's policy-making council had agreed in principle last week on the need to think of longer-term stabilisation measures.

"Everyone knows that after 30 days, there will be a vacuum of some sort that will have to be filled to ensure that the whole thing doesn't blow up again," Brodeur told Reuters.

But it was too early to say if NATO or perhaps a "coalition of the willing" among member states would assume a security role.