 |
NATO to Send More Troops to Guard Kosovo-Macedonia Border
NATO said Monday that it would ask member states to send more troops to help guard the border between Kosovo and Macedonia and to curb the movement of ethnic Albanian rebels.
Secretary-General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, George Robertson, announced the move after meeting Foreign Minister of Macedonia Srjan Kerim, who has come to appeal for actions rather than words from the country's western allies to cope with the current crisis.
"We'll be asking individual (NATO) members to add to the troops they have in Kosovo in order that more flexibility can be given to the task," said the NATO chief, and added that the international community would not seek an extended United Nations mandate to operate within Macedonia itself.
But Robertson declined to say how many more troops would be sent to the border region between the Yugoslav province and the former Yugoslav republic. Troops from the United States and Germany are currently guarding the border between Kosovo and Macedonia.
"The number of troops in the border region will be adequate for the task that is set out and the objective will be pursued with considerable vigor," and the aim of the move was to curb the movement of ethnic Albanian rebels, he said.
In Macedonia, however, bursts of machine-gun and mortar fires sounded again Monday for a consecutive sixth day at Tetovo, Macedonia's second largest city and the country's main ethnic Albanian town close to Kosovo.
Four tanks were reportedly transported to the scene to reinforce the government troops already in position against the rebellious ethnic Albanians who took position up the mountains overseeing Tetovo.
The Macedonian foreign minister would also visit the European Union headquarters for help on Monday. Foreign ministers from EU countries were meeting Monday to discuss the situation in Macedonia.
EU member state Austria also said the EU should consider asking the United Nations Security Council to extend the mandate for the NATO-led Kosovo peacekeeping force and allow it to operate in Macedonia.
But German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer told the press before the meeting that it was still not the right time to discuss such bold moves. "We have to discuss the situation calmly and responsibly," he said.
Observers here said that what the Macedonian foreign minister would get from his flash visit to the EU would probably be maximum political support to the country's struggle against violence by ethnic Albanian rebels.
Earlier, Macedonian Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski, frustrated by the violence around Tetovo, has described the wavering of the West as permitting the creation of a new Taliban in Europe.
The prime minister said that NATO has refused to recognize the fact that the rebels has come from neighboring Kosovo and that the United States and Germany knew the identities of rebel leaders and could stop them if they chose to.
Government officials in Macedonia believed that the arms and rebels were penetrated into the country from Kosovo, where separatists were encouraged by NATO to fight against Yugoslav troops.
The conflict around Tetovo has lasted six days with the government troops still firing onto the mountains supposed to have been used by rebels as a front position to launch attacks against government troops and police.
In This Section
|