Macedonia with minority government until NATO summit

17/03/2008

With less than a month to go before NATO meets in Bucharest, parliamentary parties have agreed to support Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski. However, a new crisis broke out Monday as Democratic Party of Albanians members threatened a boycott.

By Zoran Nikolovski for Southeast European Times in Skopje – 17/03/08

Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski arrives for an urgent meeting with leaders of the major political parties in Skopje. [Getty Images]

Macedonia's main political parties agreed Saturday (March 15th) that Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski should run a minority government until the NATO summit in Bucharest is held beginning April 2nd. But a new row erupted Monday as members of the Democratic Party of Albania (DPA) threatened a boycott of government institutions.

The DPA left the ruling coalition last week, saying Gruevski had refused the party's demands. However, all of Macedonia's parliamentary parties -- including the DPA --agreed Saturday that the current administration should continue, given the critical situation Macedonia faces with regards to its NATO bid.

That bid is in jeopardy due to the ongoing name dispute with Greece, a member of the Alliance. Athens has said it will use its veto power to prevent an invitation being given to Macedonia unless an acceptable formula is reached prior to the summit.

The Gruevski government faces another round of talks in Vienna this week, where UN special envoy Matthew Nimetz is meeting negotiators from both sides.

"We will function as a minority government for the next two or three weeks, with broad political support, and we are hopeful that such a relationship will be demonstrated in the parliament," Foreign Minister Antonio Milososki said Saturday.

Jani Makraduli, vice president of the largest opposition party -- the Social Democratic Union for Macedonia (SDSM) -- said that as a responsible party, SDSM would back the government until April.

The DPA broke with the ruling coalition last week because it did not gain support for some of its proposals, including for wider use of the Albanian language and flag, and more benefits for ethnic Albanian veterans of the 2001 conflict. The DPA also wants Macedonia to recognise newly-independent Kosovo.

Despite its withdrawal, the party originally agreed to back the minority government. On Monday, however, a key member, Deputy Prime Minister Imer Aliu, said the DPA could no longer work with Gruevski. He said he would ask the party leadership to issue a statement calling on ethnic Albanians to withdraw from government institutions.

Aliu's comments were seemingly provoked by an interview Gruevski gave over the weekend, in which he suggested that the DPA was working on behalf of foreign interests.

Even with a DPA boycott, the Gruevski administration should still be able to function since it still has sufficient parliamentary support.

President Branko Crvenkovski, an SDSM member, said with only 20 days to go until the April summit, the talks with Greece are in their "most delicate phase".

He also signaled the window is open for a possible compromise. "If a formulation with an additional term or an adjective -- which will not mean destruction of the national identity but rather an additional description of our state arrangement -- is found, I think we can achieve both countries' goals," the president said. His comment appeared to deviate from Macedonia's previous stance, under which any modification of the country's name had been ruled out.