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Skopje, September 10th , 2001
Security situation
Existence of military formation in Prilep.
For ten days already, there is a military formation called "Poskok"
present in Prilep, which forcefully collects finances for its needs and
"for maintaining of integrity and sovereignty of the Republic of
Macedonia." Numerous enterprises from Prilep complain already that
some of them were forced to give certain amount of money. The Ministry
of Interior claims that this is a case of a criminal-racketeering formation.
Three civilians kidnapped and then released.
The Macedonian media reported that on September 5th, in the Block 82 district,
three civilians, ethnic Macedonians, were kidnapped and few hours later
released by the extremists.
The border crossing to Kosovo unblocked.
The road to Kosovo, which was blocked by the World Macedonian Congress
and displaced persons from the Tetovo villages on August 18th, was unblocked
by the Macedonian police on September 6th. A day earlier, on September
5th, the border crossing near Tabanovce at the border with Yugoslavia
was also unblocked.
Political situation
President Trajkovski's proposal for starting a process
for constitutional changes accepted.
On September 6th, the Assembly of the Republic of Macedonia with vast
majority voted out the initiative by the President for starting a process
for changes to the Constitution of the Republic of Macedonia. 91 deputies
voted in favor of the proposal, 19 were against and two were abstained.
The decision was put in force immediately and in the next ten days the
submitter of the proposal is obliged to develop draft-amendments with
his associates. Later on, the deputies will vote on these amendments.
Second phase of the "Essential Harvest" operation continues.
The second phase of the operation "Harvest" continued on September
7th. In the village of Radusa in Skopje area, the members of NLA surrended
160 pieces of weapons. On September 9th, the operation continued in the
village of Brodec, where on the first day 100 pieces of weapons were collected,
as well as 20 antitank mines and 5,000 pieces of ammunition. Due to security
reasons, NATO will not reveal the locations of the other posts for collection
of voluntarily surrended weapons from the NLA. On September 3, in the
military polygon of Krivolak, part of the ammunition and mines collected
so far was destroyed.
Possible returning of the UNPREDEP soldiers in Macedonia.
The President of the Republic of Macedonia launched an initiative for
re-activating of the UNPREDEP mission in Macedonia. This mission was established
in Macedonia in 1995 and ended in 1999. The request should be submitted
to the UN Secretary General, but its realization will depend on the position
of the five permanent members of the Security Council.
Western diplomats pay a visit to Skopje.
Numerous western diplomats, among whom German Foreign Minister Joschka
Fischer, EU High Representative of Common Foreign and Security Policy
Javier Solana, Euro-Commissioner Chris Patten, German Defense Minister
Rudolf Scharping paid a visit to Skopje last week. At the meetings they
realized with the Macedonian state leadership they positively evaluated
the decision of the parliament members to launch a process for making
constitutional changes.
Increased number of OSCE monitors.
On September 6th the OSCE permanent council reached
a decision to expand the mission in Macedonia from 26 to 51 member.
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