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Macedonia rebels under fire

SKOPJE, Macedonia -- The Macedonian army resumed shelling ethnic Albanian rebels as the main political parties tried to form a coalition aimed at preventing all-out war.

Heavy artillery and machine guns hit the northeastern village of Slupcane shortly before 9 a.m. (0700 GMT) on Tuesday, Reuters news agency reported.

"The military operation will continue today in Slupcane and Vakcince," government spokesman Antonio Milosovski said. The two villages are seen as the main rebel strongholds and have been under bombardment since last Thursday.

VIDEO

CNN's Patricia Kelly has more on the possible sanctions that could be imposed on Macedonia (May 8)

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AUDIO

Journalist Juliette Terzieff: Coalition talks continue amid fighting 54 secs / 577 Kb AIFF or WAV sound

OSCE special representative Robert Frowick: A volatile situation 36 secs / 390 Kb AIFF or WAV sound

Journalist Juliette Terzieff: There isn't much time to form the coalition 30 secs / 329 Kb AIFF or WAV sound

Journalist Juliette Terzieff: Albanian rebels and Macedonian government will keep on fighting 35 secs / 375 Kb AIFF or WAV sound

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana shows support for Macedonian people

116K/21 sec.
AIFF or WAV sound

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Meanwhile, Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski said he was confident of the imminent formation of a national unity government that would improve the prospects for peace in the ongoing conflict with ethnic Albanian rebels.

Georgievski also said plans to declare a state of war in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to deal with the insurgency had been dropped.

"The great percentage of the deal is done. I am optimistic that we will form a grand coalition tomorrow. There is some fine tuning to be done," he said on Monday.

Georgievski said the two main opposition parties -- the Slav-dominated Socialists and the ethnic Albanian Party for Democratic Prosperity (PDP) -- would join the government.

It currently comprises three parties including the main Albanian DPA grouping and Georgievski's Slav VMRO-DPME.

But PDP spokesman Zahir Bekteshi said his grouping was still insisting that military operations against the rebels must stop before it agreed to join the government. PDP leaders were to meet on Tuesday to discuss the situation.

Participation in the government of the opposition Social Democrats and the opposition ethnic Albanian Party for Democratic Prosperity is seen by many analysts as an important step to ending the fighting between government troops and ethnic Albanian rebels.

'Brink of abyss'

The United Nations said hundreds of ethnic Albanian refugees crossed into Kosovo on Monday.

The rebels say they are fighting for greater rights in Macedonia, while the government says they are trying to break the area away to join ethnic Albanians in Kosovo.

"This country may well be on brink of an abyss, but I believe there is enough common sense and political courage to step back," NATO Secretary General George Robertson said after talks with the Macedonian leadership.

Describing the rebels as "a bunch of murderous thugs" out to destroy the republic, Robertson said: "A downward spiral of violence into another Balkans bloodbath would produce only misery."

Robertson and Javier Solana, the European Union's representative for foreign and security policy, both argued against a declaration of war by Macedonia, which threatened to divide the Macedonian Slavs and ethnic Albanian coalition.

Solana had also urged Macedonian party leaders to form the unity government.

"I have been working very hard with your leaders and they have been working very hard to reach an agreement," Solana told reporters. He extended his visit to Skopje on Monday to take part in the talks on a "grand government coalition."

Robertson said NATO southern commander Admiral James Ellis would meet Macedonia's military chief of staff to discuss closer co-operation with Macedonian forces, but gave no details.

He also vowed "aggressive policing of the Kosovo border" with Macedonia by NATO-led forces.

The main battleground is 30 km (20 miles) northwest of the capital Skopje, close to the main Greece-to-Hungary highway.

It is a 15-minute drive from the Yugoslav border, where the highway runs north along the rebel-infested edge of southern Serbia's Presevo Valley.

The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and the Red Cross said hundreds of mainly ethnic Albanian civilians were taking refuge in their basements in Vakcince and Slupcane.