13 March 2001
Presevo Truce Holds; Fire Exchanged in Macedonia
By Dragan Stankovic
LUCANE, Yugoslavia (Reuters) - A cease-fire held on Tuesday between ethnic
Albanian guerrillas and state security forces in Serbia's volatile Presevo
Valley, but in neighboring Macedonia troops exchanged fire with a different
group of gunmen.
The Presevo cease-fire, brokered by NATO (news - web sites), was designed
to end a year of sporadic violence and pave the way for a peace settlement
there as well as to help Macedonia in its more recent struggle against Albanian
guerrillas believed to be supplied from Presevo.
``If yesterday was a historic day, this is also a historic day because the
night was completely quiet. There were no provocations or armed attacks by
the Albanian extremists,'' a Serbian spokesman said after the truce took
hold at midnight.
Life was returning to normal in the village of Lucane, the scene of serious
clashes between police and ethnic Albanian guerrillas over the weekend. Police
were in their usual positions but guerrillas had vanished and traffic had
resumed.
More than 30 people have been killed in or near that part of the NATO-ordained
buffer zone between Kosovo and Serbia proper, which runs through the Presevo
Valley.
The clashes have alarmed Western governments as they have the potential to
ignite a larger conflict in the region.
An official in Macedonia said its forces had fought ethnic Albanian gunmen
Tuesday to try to drive them out of what he said were their last strongholds
near the border with Kosovo.
Interior Ministry spokesman Stevo Pendarovski said police special forces
were trying to take over parts of the villages of Brest and Malino.
``This morning there was shooting, police returned fire. This operation is
very risky and dangerous,'' he said, adding that the government side had
suffered no casualties.
The leader of the ethnic Albanian gunmen, contacted by telephone, said there
had only been sporadic firing Monday and Tuesday and that neither side had
changed positions.
``There are reinforcements by the Macedonian forces in the direction of Tanusevci
and the village of Lukar,'' he said. ''There are no casualties,'' said the
man, nicknamed Commander Hoxha.
In the Macedonian capital Skopje around 10,000 ethnic Albanians staged a
demonstration which organizers said was designed to show that most of Macedonia's
Albanians opposed violence but nevertheless wanted greater rights.
Heavy Weapons Still Deployed In Presevo
The cease-fire deal in the Presevo Valley, brokered by NATO envoy Peter Feith
in several days of shuttle diplomacy, included a clause on the withdrawal
of heavy weaponry from a point near Bujanovac, just outside the buffer zone.
Tanks and other heavy equipment have been dug in since November between Bujanovac
and Lucane village, where Serbian police and guerrillas are positioned about
100 meters apart. Their withdrawal was planned for Tuesday but then delayed.
``There will be no withdrawal of heavy weaponry today,'' Milan Milkovic,
a government spokesman told reporters outside Lucane.
``We must prepare ourselves better for that, organize that process a bit
better,'' he said. A separate accord between NATO and Belgrade signed Monday
will allow the Yugoslav army back into a 9.6 square mile part of the buffer
zone running along the border with Macedonia to help cut the guerrillas'
supply lines.
Yugoslav Defense Minister Slobodan Krapovic said the timing for the deployment
had not yet been set.
``We have not received full assurances over the safety of our soldiers and
police forces. We are aware of existing minefields among other risks,'' he
said during a visit to Bulgaria.
But preparatory work appeared to have started Tuesday. From the Kosovo side
of the boundary with the zone where it meets the Macedonian border, about
a dozen Yugoslav forces personnel could be seen on a hill inside the zone.
Norwegian peacekeepers putting up notices along the boundary said the Yugoslavs
had been allowed in at 1 p.m.
The notices said ``Kosovo-Serbian border'' in both Serbian and Albanian and
warned people they could be arrested for crossing outside official points.
They also said Yugoslav forces could not pass that point.
The commander of the guerrilla group in Serbia has warned he cannot guarantee
the safety of Serb forces returning to the zone against ``spontaneous actions
of local Albanian elements,'' according to a source close to the rebel group.
``We don't trust the Serbs,'' one guerrilla in the area said, referring to
years of Serb repression of ethnic Albanians under former Yugoslav leader
Slobodan Milosevic (news - web sites).
Some officials from the new government in Belgrade, which has promised to
improve life for Albanians in Serbia, have said NATO has placed so many restrictions
on the returning forces that they may be unable to defend themselves from
attack.
The Presevo Valley rebels say they are not near the border.
Both they and the gunmen in Macedonia say they are fighting for more rights
for local ethnic Albanian minorities. The governments of Serbia and Macedonia
say they are terrorists whose only aim is to merge border areas with ethnic
Albanian-dominated Kosovo province.