Posted on 03/04/2003 2:14:38 PM PST by bobi
NATO soldiers killed in blast From correspondents in Skopje March 05, 2003
TWO soldiers serving with NATO forces in Macedonia have been killed in an explosion.
Three civilians were also injured in the blast, blamed on an explosive device.
The soldiers' nationality has not been revealed, but private television station A1 reported that they were Polish.
Craig Ratcliff, a spokesman for troops serving with the military alliance in Macedonia confirmed that the deaths occurred "as a result of heavy injuries from the explosion".
Details surrounding the incident were unclear.
Ratcliff earlier said that the troops were in the vicinity of an explosive device that somebody was trying to dispose of in the northern region of Kumanovo.
NATO forces have been deployed in the former Yugoslav republic since September 2001 after a Western-brokered peace deal ended fighting between Macedonian government forces and ethnic Albanian rebels.
A peacekeeping force from the European Union is due to start a tour of duty on the ground in Macedonia this month, the EU presidency has said, spearheading the bloc's first ever such role.
Agence France-Presse
From Macedonian sources i.e. A1 Television, 1 Macedonian citizen (translator) and 2 local villagers were wounded.
More to follow ....
The NATO jeep was simply in the way and the device whos natural function is to explode did so in the vicinity of the NATO soldiers.
The investigators were trying to interogate the explosive device but the thing was into pieces.
NATO recently in the Balkans has been having problems with extreme right wing explosive devices that do not agree with the current peace process. NATO is planning an explosive education campaign to educate these extremists that blowing someone is not the way to go.
hmmmm
Two NATO soldiers die in Macedonia accident blast
04 Mar 2003 23:11
SKOPJE, March 4 (Reuters) - Two NATO soldiers were killed late on Tuesday and three civilians were seriously hurt when an explosive device was accidentally set off in northern Macedonia.
A NATO official in Skopje said the incident happened near the village of Kumanovo, in northern Macedonia, when an unexploded ordnance the civilians were delivering to the soldiers was set off by accident.
The official said it was not clear why the civilians were taking the device to the soldiers, but suggested that they might have been trying to get help in dismantling the device, apparently left over from the country's 2001 ethnic conflict.
The soldiers died on the way to a hospital while the civilians, one of them a local NATO translator, were taken to a hospital in critical condition.
The soldiers were part of a NATO peacekeeping force deployed in Macedonia to oversee the implementation of a Western brokered peace deal that ended a six-month ethnic conflict in 2001.
A small contingent of around 400 NATO soldiers remains in this southern Balkan country to protect international observers and secure peace. ((Reporting by Kole Casule, edited by Sami Aboudi, kole.casule@reuters.com, tel +389 70 233632))
NATO is so compromised by its support of Islamic terrorists in the Balkans that they bend the truth beyond recognition.
yes they are........and so far some 75-85 NATO soldiers have been killed in the area..........recall that Clinton and his HumWarriors aided & abeted these KLA Jihadistas.
Maybe to kill them?
A Muslim Albanian villagers bringing an explosive device to the military allience (NATO) that is saving them from the evil Macedonians and Serbs with the intention of killing them is is is ......... oooohhh I can't bear the thought ....
It is just tooo difficult for the official to understand the situation .....
We shall investigate
Two NATO Soldiers Die in Macedonia Blast Tue Mar 4,10:07 PM ET
KONSTANTIN TESTORIDES, Associated Press Writer
SKOPJE, Macedonia - An explosion Tuesday in Macedonia's northwest killed two NATO (news - web sites) peacekeepers and wounded three civilians, an alliance official said.
The blast occurred near the villages of Sopot and Sicevo, 25 miles northeast of the capital, Skopje, in an area where ethnic Albanian insurgents battled government troops in 2001, NATO spokesman Craig Ratcliff said.
A Western official speaking on condition of anonymity, said the soldiers died when a land mine went off as it was being defused.
Ratcliff refused to identify the soldiers and their nationality pending notification of their families. But the Western official said the two dead were Polish.
Macedonian police and hospital officials said that the civilians suffered multiple injuries and their condition is serious.
During a 2001 rebellion, the Macedonian army laid several mine fields along the border with neighboring Kosovo in an attempt to stop ethnic Albanian insurgents from crossing the border into the country.
U.N. ordnance disposal experts and Macedonian police have since been trying to remove the mines from the area.
The six-month conflict ended with a Western-brokered peace plan that gave broader rights to Macedonia's ethnic Albanian community — nearly a third of the country's population of 2 million.
A 450-strong NATO mission — including 19 Polish soldiers — is in the country to monitor the peace deal.
THIS WAS IN 2001
Soldiers killed in Macedonia blast August 10, 2001 Posted: 6:22 AM EDT (1022 GMT)
SKOPJE, Macedonia -- Eight Macedonian soldiers have been killed in a landmine explosion near the capital Skopje, news agencies are reporting.
Six soldiers were wounded in the explosion, a Macedonian army spokesman told Reuters.
"Eight dead. They ran over mines. They were in a truck on the road between Ljubanci and Ljuboten," the spokesman said, referring to two villages north of Skopje.
"There were three mines, they have used the road often before and never had any problems."
NATO jeep hits landmine in Macedonia | 22:24 |SKOPJE -- Tuesday – Five people were injured this evening when a jeep owned by the NATO mission in Macedonia hit a landmine on a road in the Kumanovo district, close to the Kosovo border.
Macedonian police have confirmed that those seriously injured included a female interpreter, two civilians and two NATO soldiers, one of whom is in a critical condition. Kumanovo police and NATO officers are investigating.
I don't believe that the civilians went up to NATO soldiers with the device in their hands and threw it or exploded it as you're implying. Albanians have never been engaged in suicide bombings like the Palestinians. The civilians were probably riding in the jeep with the soldiers and the interpreter, or they were nearby. The fact is that they were seriously injured. Why would they do something to risk injury when they could just plant a landmine or denote a remote control device from a safe distance?
A NATO official in Skopje said the incident happened near the village of Kumanovo, in northern Macedonia, when an unexploded ordnance the civilians were delivering to the soldiers was set off by accident.
The official said it was not clear why the civilians were taking the device to the soldiers, but suggested that they might have been trying to get help in dismantling the device, apparently left over from the country's 2001 ethnic conflict.
Another article tries to make it seem almost like an act of kindness by adding a NATO spokesperson's comment that "well-wishing persons often leave unexploded mines at the side of the road, hoping that the authorities or demining teams would pick them up".
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