Macedonia pulls back from the abyss

Skopje, Macedonia's largest city, is situated along a major route between Belgrade and Athens, which makes it important politically and economically to the Balkans

By John Christensen
CNN Interactive

(CNN) -- On Jan. 11, 2000, three Macedonian policemen were killed by gunmen when they tried to stop what they believed was a stolen vehicle.

The incident took place near Aracinovo, a town 6 miles (10 kilometers) north of the capital of Skopje. Aracinovo, populated mostly by ethnic Albanians, has become a hub for crime and illegal trade since the end of the war in Kosovo.

The incident might have been dismissed as just another item on the police blotter if it had happened elsewhere. Not in Macedonia, where ethnic animosities run bitter and deep. The slain policemen were Macedonians and the gunmen are believed to be ethnic Albanians.

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It was the kind of episode Balkans watchers have feared for years. People in Macedonia and elsewhere held their breath, fearing the kind of ethnic violence that consumed Bosnia and Kosovo.

"Macedonians and ethnic Albanians don't like each other," says Michael G. Roskin, chair and professor of political science at Lycoming College in Pennsylvania. "They have gotten along because they were afraid of being swallowed by the tempest [Kosovo] around them. But basically they don't like each other."

A former Yugoslav republic, Macedonia became independent in 1991, but a dispute with Greece over its name forced it to call itself the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. Tensions with the Greeks have eased, and the dispute may be settled peaceably, but it is indicative of the deep and sometimes perplexing antagonisms common in the Balkans.

Macedonia was the poorest of the Yugoslav republics. Independence has not improved conditions. Transportation and highways are poor, there is little industry, and the Gross Domestic Product is only 55 percent of what it was in 1989. Roughly 54 percent of the workers are unemployed. The birth rate is high among the 2 million inhabitants, especially for ethnic Albanians.

Agriculture remains essential to Macedonia's economy, particularly the production of fruits, vegetables, rice, tobacco and wine. The country's metals and textile manufacturing industries, developed during the Tito era, have declined since Yugoslavia's breakup, and the unemployment rate stands at 54 percent.

The United States gave Macedonia $22 million in December. NATO troops have brought internal stability, plus they have filled Skopje's restaurants and hotels. But as a cab driver told a reporter for the Atlanta Constitution, "It would be better ... if our factories worked."

"The place works on remittances," says Roskin. Even as part of Yugoslavia, Roskin says, Marshal Josip Broz Tito let ethnic Albanians leave the country to work in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, knowing they would send money back to their families.

"That's why in Tetovo and Gostivar [in northwestern Macedonia] you'll see large, modern comfortable homes belonging to ethnic Albanians," Roskin says. "Daddy's working in Switzerland. On the average, many of them are richer than Slavic Macedonians."

Macedonia is run by a tenuous coalition of Slavic Macedonians and ethnic Albanians. In exchange for votes from ethnic Albanians -- who number about 33 percent of the population -- the Macedonian-dominated VMRO party has given ethnic Albanians positions in government and countenances a de facto partition of the country. Western Macedonia is heavily populated -- and controlled -- by ethnic Albanians.

Utrinski Vesnik, a Macedonian newspaper in Skopje, accused the coalition of allowing the country to fragment into "spheres of interest and party territories" patrolled by men "armed to the teeth ... with Kalashnikovs [assault rifles] on their shoulders."

The paper also decried "amateurism and tyranny -- especially in the very sensitive area of internal affairs -- where sheriffs and cowboys and parade men promenade, all at the expense of professionalism and expertise."

William N. Dunn, professor of public policy and management at the University of Pittsburgh's Graduate School of Public and International Affairs and a frequent visitor to the area, sees two major issues.

This market scene in Skopje reflects Macedonia's diverse culture. But religious affiliation and ethnic background are two of the issues that divide its people.

First, the government led by 43-year-old Boris Trajkovski lacks the maturity and stature of its predecessor: "I think this government has less capability to handle problems than the one led by President [Kiro] Gligorov, who had experience and moral authority," Dunn says.

Second, although Serbians once considered Macedonia as southern Serbia, the presence of NATO troops has forced Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic to turn his attentions elsewhere. The danger to Macedonia thus lies within.

The prospect of partitioning western Macedonia and the deal that won Trajkovski the presidency have sent expectations of ethnic Albanians "way up," says Dunn. "The sentiment and the passion is very strong and unequivocal about independence."

While Slavic Macedonians disapprove of the partition and oppose losing western Macedonia, says Dunn, "I'm not sure they'd put up much of a fight. But it could be a flash point ...."

If western Macedonia does gain independence, the most likely scenario is that it would form a weak confederation with Albania and, eventually, with Kosovo. (Roskin says current U.S. policy, which maintains that Kosovo is still part of Yugoslavia, is "whacko.")

The deaths of the policemen notwithstanding, Macedonia does not appear to be as volatile as it has been, according to some observers. The NATO troops have had something to do with it, as has the war in Kosovo.

"The lesson from Kosovo is to maintain some kind of coexistence," says Janusz Bugajski, director of Eastern European Studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank in Washington, D.C. "It's to find ways of living together to prevent a Kosovo scenario."

Indeed, despite long-standing tensions and unresolved fears, Macedonians seem to have a knack for pulling back from the abyss.

"So many observers familiar with the Balkans have been saying for so long that the country's going to fall apart, and it hasn't happened yet," says Dunn. "It's still tenuous, but in some ways it's better."