Macedonia: Ethnic Albanian leaders call for protectorate.

(From BBC Monitoring International Reports)

Leaders of ethnic Albanian parties in Macedonia have accused the Macedonian authorities of deliberately raising tensions in the country ahead of the upcoming parliamentary elections. They appealed to the Albanian population to remain united and cool-headed and not to fall for provocations which they sees as being designed to destabilize the country. At the same time the international community is being urged to place Macedonian under a protectorate in order to manage what the Albanian leaders see as a "chaotic" situation. The following is the text of report by I. Sinani and S. Saliu titled "Albanian leaders appeal for cool-headedness" by Macedonian Albanian-language newspaper Fakti on 1 September:

Attorney General Stavre Dzikov and Interior Minister Ljube Boskovski warned that they would soon arrest Ali Ahmeti, former political leader of the National Liberation Army [NLA - UCK in Albanian], now chairman of the Democratic Union for Integration [BDI].

As Dzikov said, the Office of the Attorney General, together with the Shkup [Skopje]-2 court of first instance, has issued an arrest warrant for Ahmeti. The task of arresting him lies with the Interior Ministry, which should arrest Ali Ahmeti soon.

Likewise, Dzikov said that the arrest warrant issued by the court is also valid for Fazli Veliu and Gezim Ostreni, as the architects of the war of the Albanians in Macedonia last year who are now part of the top BDI structures.

Meanwhile, Agron Dehari, aged 29, from Recica of Tetova [Tetovo], was found dead in Tetova in the early hours of yesterday morning. His family said that the police killed him. Harun Bakiu was seriously wounded in the same incident.

Only a few hours earlier, several Macedonian civilians were kidnapped on the Tetova-Gostivar highway. After this, Macedonian special forces blocked the road.