Macedonia targets rebel stronghold

Civilians have been gathering on Macedonia's border

Macedonian forces have launched an attack on one of the main strongholds of ethnic Albanian rebels in the north of the country.

Reporters heard heavy shelling coming from the direction of the village, Slupcane, on the third day of a ground offensive to drive the rebels from the area.

There are reports of dozens of casualties, both among the rebels and among civilians, but no independent confirmation.

The BBC correspondent in Macedonia, Nick Thorpe, says the plight of any civilians remaining in the area is catastrophic.

Some reports say that villagers attempting to leave were turned back by guerrillas. However one rebel commander said they had been encouraged to follow the 3,000 people who have already taken flight.

Exodus

It is only us left in Slupcane, we can defend ourselves

Rebel leader

On Saturday a leader of the rebel National Liberation Army confirmed that Vakcince had been abandoned, but said his men were holding positions above the village.

Our correspondent Colin Blane who has been to Vakcince said after two days of heavy shelling, the last of the civilian population emerged having huddled together in cellars for weeks.

He said with the Macedonian army and police in control, the streets were deserted. Newly constructed houses had their roofs missing, blown off in the shelling.

"Access to Vaksince remained extremely restricted, but every house I saw had sustained at least some artillery damage. The soldiers now guarding the village were watchful and nervous, aware that the guerrillas had succeeded in melting away," he said.

The rebels say they have taken up new positions in the hills. Elsewhere to the west the thunder of artillery and mortars could be heard as the village of Slupcane came under heavy bombardment.

One report quoted a rebel leader as saying that civilians had left Slupcane for the nearby village of Lipkovo.

"It is only us left in Slupcane, we can defend ourselves," he said.

About 1,000 people left Vakcince on Friday, escorted by police on foot for 5km (three miles) over fields and then taken in buses to safety.

Vakcince was the army's main focus on Friday

They followed an exodus of an estimated 2,000 people who fled mainly from Lojane on Thursday night, heading north into Serbia.

The government had repeatedly urged villagers to flee, ahead of the military action, anxious to maintain international sympathy and avoid radicalising moderate Albanians.

Several more villages further south remain under the control of the rebels - who emerged in the area three weeks ago - and correspondents say the army will not stop now until it has recaptured them all.

Political row

The army launched its offensive on Thursday as a political storm broke over a secret move by two ethnic Albanian political parties to negotiate directly with the rebels.

The government had urged people to move to safety

The row threatens to break up the governing coalition, with Prime Minister Ljubco Georgievski accusing the two party leaders involved of taking their parties "into a terrorist organisation".

The move by Arben Xhaferi of the Democratic Party of Albanians (DPA) and Imer Imeri of the Party for Democratic Prosperity (PDP) to sign an accord on "common action" with the rebels provoked international condemnation.

The deal offered the rebels amnesty guarantees and a right of veto over decisions about ethnic Albanian rights, if they agreed to stop fighting.

Mr Xhaferi appeared confident on Friday that he and Mr Imeri would not be thrown out of government, saying that there were no other ethnic Albanian leaders for the Macedonians to deal with, in any attempt to stabilise the country.

The Albanian minority is estimated to account for one third of the Macedonian population.

Both the rebels and the mainstream ethnic Albanian parties want to see a change to the constitution which would give Macedonia's large ethnic Albanian minority the same status as the majority Slavs and make Albanian an official language.

However, the rebels are also widely believed to be seeking to annex Albanian-populated areas to Kosovo or Albania.