An ethnic-Albanian guerrilla keeps an eye on a Macedonian border
Why is there new fighting along Kosovo's borders almost two years after NATO drove out the Serb forces?
The new fighting is taking place in two regions — Serbia's Presevo Valley, which borders eastern Kosovo, and northern Macedonia. The valley falls inside a buffer zone created at the end of the Kosovo war, into which neither NATO nor Yugoslavia can send troops. That's created a vacuum into which Albanian nationalist guerrillas have moved, hoping to annex the territory, whose population is mostly ethnic Albanian, to Kosovo and ultimately into a "Greater Albania."
In Macedonia, guerrilla groups with links to the KLA claim to be fighting to "liberate" territory for that country's ethnic-Albanian minority, which constitutes close to one third of Macedonia's population. They have demanded that Macedonia be divided on federal lines, creating separate political entities for its Albanian minority and its Slav majority. Observers believe this goal is a step towards uniting predominantly Albanian areas of Macedonia with Kosovo and, ultimately, in a "Greater Albania." Their strategy appears to be taken from the KLA playbook: mount small-scale attacks on government forces in order to goad the authorities into overreacting, in the hope that this will boost local and international support for the guerrillas.
What's the Kosovo connection?
Albanian fighters in both the Presevo Valley and Macedonia depend on their comrades in Kosovo for arms and logistical support, and they appear to have found elements of the now disbanded Kosovo Liberation Army eager to help. Kosovo's Albanian nationalists are frustrated by NATO's reluctance to endorse their goal of formal independence, and by the West's rapprochement with post-Milosevic Yugoslavia.
Although it is under the political control of the U.N. and the NATO-led peacekeeping force, Kosovo remains legally part of Yugoslavia. The Western alliance has been reluctant to concede to full independence for the territory for fear of sparking attempts by Albanians living in Macedonia and elsewhere to attempt a similar redrawing of borders. And the ouster of Slobodan Milosevic last year has made working with Yugoslavia a lot more palatable to the West.
Why has Macedonia been of such particular concern to NATO?
While the Western alliance initially responded sluggishly to the insurgency in Presevo, it jumped into action in Macedonia, sending U.S. troops into a gun battle with Albanian guerrillas holed up in the village of Tanusevci. The concern is that even the relatively minor insurgency could spark a major conflagration in the former Yugoslav republic, whose majority Slav population is wary of the growth of its Albanian minority, which currently constitutes between 20 and 30 percent of its populace. That fear appears to have been realized, as the fighting in Macedonia has radicalized both ethnic communities and dimmed prospects for reconciliation.
NATO rushed to shore up Macedonia during the Kosovo war too, in particular helping the country accommodate and then quickly return hundreds of thousands of refugees from Kosovo whose presence left the Slavic majority uneasy. The alliance's quick response to the latest insurgency may be guided by the same concern, and a fear that an Albanian-Slav conflict in Macedonia could easily draw in Albania, Bulgaria, Greece and other regional powers.
Can NATO stop the simmering conflicts from erupting into a full-blown war?
NATO hopes that tightening border controls between Macedonia and Kosovo, combined with its decision to allow Yugoslav forces back into the Presevo Valley buffer zone, has sent a message to the Albanian separatists that armed actions will not be rewarded with political gain. But there are doubts over whether Macedonia's military alone will be able to end the insurgency, particularly in light of the substantial support the guerrillas appear to have won in the local Albanian community. Indeed, even moderate Albanian parties that have participated in Macedonia's democratic process are demanding a separate political entity — a demand the government in Skopje sees as the first step towards the disintegration of the country. So whatever the outcome of the latest insurgency, the underlying tensions between the region's rival nationalisms may be beyond resolution. Most observers believe that even almost two years after the Kosovo campaign and six years after the Dayton Accord brought hostilities to an end in Bosnia, NATO peacekeeping forces are all that remains between a fragile peace and new wars in the Balkans.