KOSOVO PROVISIONAL GOVERNING COUNCIL ON SITUATION IN MACEDONIA

PRISTINA, March 27 (Hina) - The leaders of three major Kosovo Albanian parties on Tuesday requested international factors to step up pressure on the Macedonian government to stop the offensive in Macedonia, adding Macedonian authorities had violated a recent declaration of Kosovo political leaders. Following today's session of Kosovo's Provisional Governing Council, the president of the Kosovo Democratic Party, Hashim Thaqi, and the president of the Alliance for Kosovo's Future, Ramush Haradinaj, called on the Macedonian government to start dialogue and meet the demands of Albanians living in Macedonia. They expressed concern about the latest developments assessing that Macedonian authorities had violated a declaration on the resolution of problems with democratic means, signed last week by three leading Albanian political officials. Thaqi said the narrowing of the safety zone and the deployment of the Yugoslav army along the Montenegrin-Kosovo border was a hasty move, adding the buffer zone should have been widened instead. Haradinaj said the agreement on the narrowing of the buffer zone, reached between NATO and Serbia, would be respected, with close monitoring of the situation around the Kosovo border. (hina) rml