Brussels, 22/08/2001 (Agence Europe) - Despite the sporadic outbreaks of violence over the last few days, mainly in the north of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), the NATO Council gave, on Wednesday, after the so-called "silence" procedure (Ed.: during which the 19 Alliance members may oppose decisions), its go-ahead to the deployment of the "Essential Harvest" mission for the collection of weapons surrendered by the ethnic Albanian fighters in Macedonia. Immediately after the announcement, a first group of British parachutists, made up of around 700 men, took off from the south-west of England early in the afternoon to join a vanguard of 400 men already on the ground. Deployment should continue until Saturday until a total of 3,500 men is reached. In addition to an American logistics unit and Hungarian engineers, the mission will include contingents from 10 countries (with the number of men in brackets): - United Kingdom (1040); - France (530); - Germany (500); - Italy (450); - Greece (350); - The Netherlands (250); - Spain (130); - Czech Republic (120); - Belgium (79); - Norway (22). Deployment on the ground could take around ten days after which the operation should then not last more than one month.
Cooperation between the European Union and NATO has been crucial for the signing of the peace agreement between the Macedonian government and the Albanian UCK rebels, said Ambassador Alexis Brouhns, President of the EU Political and Security Committee (COPS), after a meeting with the members of the North Atlantic Council. This collaboration was also welcomed by NATO Secretary General Lord Robertson, who called for it to continue. EU Special Representative in Macedonia François Léotard said that joint action by the EU, NATO and the United States has "given the international community the weight it needed to bring about the constitutional changes allowing the Macedonian parties to move towards peaceful crisis management". He considered that the NATO mission would have an essential role in this "decisive period" for Macedonia's future. "The Commission and international financial institutions are preparing a donor conference", Mr. Brouhms stressed, recalling that the European Commission also had "different tools allowing for the rapid mobilisation of sums of money to contribute to the country's economic reconstruction", but, he recalled, "EU aid would remain dependent on the respect of the peace agreement and collaboration by the parties with operation "Essential Harvest".
The Macedonian authorities welcomed the launch of the operation, but a spokesman for Defence Minister Marjan Gjurovski recalled that in Skopje "civil representatives of the Macedonian Government and parliamentarians will monitor the NATO operation" and that "there is no possibility of a change to this NATO mission's brief", that was not going to Macedonia to "create a buffer zone" but to collect weapons. He reiterated the authorities' undertakings relating to the withdrawal of the Macedonian security forces from areas where NATO operates.