September 11, 2007 (RFE/RL)
Violence involving ethnic Albanians in Macedonia has sparked concerns that tensions over the unresolved status of Kosovo are beginning to bubble over. The most recent incident came on September 10 when a police commander and a gunman were killed in a clash in an ethnic Albanian village near Macedonia’’s border with Kosovo. The violence has made headlines and prompted the parliament in Skopje to call emergency sessions to discuss the situation. The latest sitting is taking place today. Some analysts suggest the incidents are tied to Kosovo, where demands by the ethnic-Albanian majority for full independence from Serbia have so far been thwarted by Belgrade and its main ally on the UN Security Council, Russia. Whatever the explanation, some six years after an internationally brokered peace deal prevented a civil war from breaking out in Macedonia, the fresh violence is again raising questions about the future of the Balkans, Europe’’s most volatile region. “[The violence] may involve matters of smugglers,” says Patrick Moore, a regional analyst for RFE/RL. “It may involve some other criminal relations. It could involve family feuds, politics, or any combination of these factors. They all overlap there.”
December 1st, 2008 at 1:13 pm
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