Word: macedonia
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...Macedonian conflict borders on the absurd - at least through the prism of NATO's wishful thinking. The troubled Balkan nation appeared to accelerate down the slide towards full-blown civil war Monday as ethnic-Albanian rebels fought government forces for control over Tetovo, Macedonia's second city which is claimed as an unofficial capital by the rebels. At the same time, Macedonians driven out of their villages by rebel forces in a familiar spectacle of Balkan "ethnic cleansing" vented their rage on Western embassies - and, inevitably, a McDonalds - in the capital overnight. The facts on the ground suggest a rapid...
...government rejects the proposal as a device that will turn Macedonia into a binational state, and ultimately lead to partition. The rebel National Liberation Movement insist they are simply an armed civil rights movement - think Dr. King with a Kalashnikov - whose ultimate objectives are simply to effect constitutional changes. On the ground, of course, they're behaving a lot more in line with their name, "liberating" chunks of territory from government control and effecting a de facto partition into rival zones of control. And that's why Macedonians on the street and in government are venting their rage not only...
...Macedonia has long been treated by the West as the model democratic citizen among the reprobate states and provinces of the former Yugoslavia. It was commended for its support of NATO during the Kosovo conflict, and had looked likely to be the first of the former Yugoslavian territories to make it into the European Union. When President Boris Trajkovski visited the White House in March this year, he and President Bush prayed together. And NATO's initial response to the Albanian insurgency was to dismiss the NLA as "murderers in the hills" (to quote the organization's secretary general, Lord...
...persistence of the insurgency, coupled with the inability of Macedonia's politicians to agree on constitutional reforms and the Western alliance's own reluctance to stand up to armed Albanian extremism saw NATO shift its position. Western mediators have spent the past two months brokering cease-fire agreements that effectively legitimize the guerrillas, which will ultimately give the "murderers in the hills" a role in shaping Macedonia's future. The Macedonian government accuses the West of siding with the guerrillas; Western mediators protest they're maintaining neutrality - but it's precisely that new-found neutrality that has left the Macedonian...
...escalation of fighting in Macedonia poses an acute dilemma for NATO. After all, in most other Balkan conflict the question has been should the alliance send troops, but in Macedonia there are already considerable numbers of NATO troops - it's the logistical rear area for the entire Kosovo peacekeeping mission. So the question facing Western leaders if full-blown war breaks out will not be whether they should send soldiers, but what orders to give those who are already there...