Macedonian soldiers killed

SKOPJE, Macedonia -- Macedonia is to introduce additional measures on the border with Kosovo after two soldiers were killed in a firefight with ethnic Albanian guerrillas.

Earlier on Sunday, an interior ministry spokesman said Macedonia had closed the border to tighten security.

Defence Ministry spokesman Georgi Trendavilov said: "The Ministry of Defence has taken all precautionary measures and the state authorities have already adopted directions for additional measures and we expect that those measures will be taken overnight."

The measures follow the deaths of two Macedonian soldiers killed near a village occupied by ethnic Albanian gunmen. One other soldier was seriously injured.

A police source said one of the soldiers died after being shot by a sniper at 9 a.m. (0800 GMT).

The others were in a vehicle that ran over a mine placed behind a security ring set up by the security forces after a firefight with the gunmen this week.

A spokesman for the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), which monitors the situation in the area bordering Kosovo, said a patrol also on the road on Sunday morning was safe and was trying to leave the area, he said.

Fighting between ethnic Albanian militants and Macedonian forces has raised concerns that the republic could be an incubator for the next round of Balkan bloodshed.

Ethnic Albanians, most of whom are Muslim, represent just over one-fifth of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia's population of two million, making them by far the country's largest ethnic minority.

Macedonian Slavs, largely of Eastern Orthodox faith, account for two-thirds of the country's citizens. Other ethnic groups -- including Turks, Gypsies and Serbs -- collectively account for about 10 percent of the population.

Reuters contributed to this report.

Macedonia: A Balkan time bomb?
March 1, 2001

Macedonian Government
OSCE

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