Skopje - A firefight broke out in the volatile northwestern Macedonia Wednesday during a police raid against a fugitive criminal, local media said. A "massive operation," which included helicopter units, was launched in the villages of Brodec, Vejce and Vesala, some 40 kilometres west of Skopje. Eyewitnesses said that fire was exchanged during the raid and that several houses were buring afterwards.
An interior ministry spokesman said that the operation was launched against a criminal group led by a Lirim Jakupi, who escaped a prison in the nearby Kosovo a few months earlier.
The spokesman, Ivo Kotevski, said that none of the policemen were injured, though some reports said that a helicopter was downed. He was without information on possible casualties among civilians.
Northwestern Macedonia, dominated by ethnic Albanians, was on the verge of a civil war in 2001.
An Albanian insurgency was quelleed and a broader conflict averted by a broad peace-and-reforms package brokered by the West to give the Albanians more rights.
The whole area, with Macedonia's second-largest city Tetovo as its hub, has however remained volatile and virtually uncontrollable, owing to the Albanians' hostility to the central government and porous borders with Kosovo to the north and Albania to the west.
In September a policeman and a crime boss were killed in a firefight in the Tetovo area and there are regular reports of armed groups appearing along the border with Kosovo.
The latest incident is certain to raise tension and foment fear of a conflict.
