"At the moment, in Macedonia, we are carefully watching the border and the internal border belt. No serious violations of this border belt have been recorded," the government spokesperson stated yesterday.
The competent officials in the Ministry of Internal Affairs also claim that the UCPMB guerrillas were not receiving weapons through smuggling channels in Macedonia.
"The statement of the British Brigadier General, Robert Fry, that the UCPMB guerrillas receive weapons bought in the western Europe through smuggling channels in Macedonia, is absolutely incorrect. We are providing maximum security of the border with FR Yugoslavia on the part bordering Kosovo, but the same is not true for KFOR soldiers, who are supposed to secure the border from the other side," claims a source in the MIA.
The former Minister of Internal Affairs and the leader of the Democratic Alliance (DS), Pavle Trajanov, claims that the KFOR officers' assertions about the smuggling channels in Macedonia used for transfer of weapons to the Albanian guerrillas in the south of Serbia are correct.
"The UCPMB fighters are definitely receiving weapons through smuggling channels in Macedonia because the reserve border guards system, used for in depth securing of the border with Kosovo, is not working anymore, which means that the 'capacity' of the border has significantly been increased. This is especially true for the region including villages of Jazince, Tanusevci, and Lojane. With two statements of KFOR officers that the guerrillas in the south of Serbia are receiving weapons through channels in Macedonia, they are giving a clear signal to our authorities that the border security is weak. The border security used to be stronger in the past, and even then we were unable to cut the weapon smuggling channels," says Trajanov.
At the KFOR press center in Skopje they say that they did not know anything about the statements given by their generals and consequently they could not say anything specific on that topic.
As we have already reported, last weekend the American daily "The New York Times" reported that General Robert Fry, the commander of the British contingent of KFOR in Kosovo, stated that the UCPMB soldiers were getting weapons bought in western European countries through smuggling channels in Macedonia.
According to the British officer, allegedly KFOR had evidence proving the delivery of weapons recently bought in Switzerland and several other European countries to guerrillas through smuggling channels in Macedonia that were previously used by the KLA.