[B]Sali Berisha honorary citizen of Debar[/B]

[I]Council of the Municipality of Debar, today's session, decided the former head of state, ex-prime minister and leader of the Democratic Party of Albania Sali Berisha, to be made an honorary citizen of Debar.

The decision on the proposal of Mayor Rushdie Ljata was taken unanimously, that it voted for all fifteen councilors, DUI, DPA, VMRO-DPMNE, SDSM, TTP and one independent candidate. The reasoning states that this recognition is awarded for "outstanding merit and contribution to the unification of Debar blood", ie the introduction of relatives from both sides of the border.

Sixty-nine year old Berisha, Albania's former head of state and former prime minister, will soon reside in Debar and a special ceremony will be awarded a plaque and key to the city.

After the defeat of the June parliamentary elections, Berisha resigned the leadership of the Democratic Party, whose head was two decades. Currently a member of the Albanian Parliament.[/I]

How beautiful is this? And soon he may be Macedonia's first Albanian Premier!!!

Good old reliable Vevcanci. Does anyone else think Sela looks like a crack addict?

[URL="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/bilingual-signs-cause-ethnic-jitters-in-macedonia"][URL="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/bilingual-signs-cause-ethnic-jitters-in-macedonia"][URL="http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/bilingual-signs-cause-ethnic-jitters-in-macedonia"][url]http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/bilingual-signs-cause-ethnic-jitters-in-macedonia[/url][/URL][/URL][/URL]

[B]Bilingual Signs Cause Ethnic Jitters in Macedonia[/B]

An ethnic Albanian mayor has threatened to retaliate after the nearby ethnic Macedonian municipality removed bilingual Macedonian-Albanian signs from its territory.


[IMG]http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/file/show//Images/Images.New/People%202/ziadin%20sela.jpg[/IMG]

The mayor of Struga in south-west Macedonia, Ziadin Sela, has expressed anger that the nearby Vevcani municipality removed bilingual signs from the regional road that leads into his municipality where the majority of people are ethnic Albanians.

The state roads authority recently removed bilingual signs in Vevcani and replaced them with ones written only in Macedonian Cyrillic letters. This was done on Vevcani’s request.

The move caused Sela to threaten to demolish the recently-built Vevcani entrance gate and a nearby small church on the boundary between the two municipalities if they prove to have been constructed on territory under his control.

“I have to obey the laws because there is no logic in legalising an illegal object,” Sela told media.

“I do not know why the agency rushed the removal of the signs. This reminds me of [Bosnia's Serb-dominated entity] Republika Srpska where signs with Latin lettering are being demolished. I do not wish for Struga to become Republika Srpska but I am here to uphold the law,” he said.

Vevcani mayor Cvetomir Ugrinoski explained that his municipality was “100 per cent populated by ethnic Macedonians and that is why we asked the agency to remove the [Albanian-language] signs”.

He accused Sela of raising ethnic tension for no reason, insisting that the Vevcani gate, which is decorated with ethnic Macedonian symbols, was only built for tourism purposes.

The local government ministry attempted to calm the situation but warned that the gate and the church should not be demolished.

“The Vevcani gate and the church are not on Struga’s territory,” minister Tahir Hani told Alsat M.

But the minister, an ethnic Albanian, also criticised the Vevcani mayor for removing the bilingual road signs.

“The Vevcani mayor should not act with prejudice regarding the signs. They should in fact be trilingual [Albanian, Macedonian and Turkish] because the regional road connects many different people from nearby municipalities and they [Vevcani] should be careful not to upset them,” Hani said.

In 2001 Macedonia went through a short armed conflict between Albanian rebels and the security forces. The conflict ended the same year with the signing of a peace accord that gave greater rights to Albanians, who make up a quarter of the country's population.

The accord also stated that there should be wider official use of Albanian and other non-majority languages. A municipality that has more than 20 per cent of a non-majority population on its territory has to allow the official use of its language alongside Macedonian.
The threat to demolish Vevcani's property is not the first time that the Struga mayor has warned that he could use force.

In November last year, Sela, who was then a legislator with the opposition Democratic Party of Albanians, threatened to burn down the national assembly if all other attempts failed to stop the passage of a controversial army bill that angered Albanians. However the government-proposed bill did not pass.

I saw him in Struga this year was having a coffee at a table near him, does look like a bit of a junkie lol.

Nothing more democratic than the mayor of one town telling the people of another town what they can/can't do in their own town.

And when we go into Albania, there will be bilingual signs in Macedonian....NOT
FFS !

The threat issued about church and gate really piss me off, what would happen if Macedonian mayors started Demolishing illegally built mosques and memorials? We would have enough demolishing to keep us busy for years. I like this actually, I want the shiptari to continually and more radically overstep there authority, its the only way Macedonians will learn and want to take actions of their own.

We all know what happens when you over play a hand. The shiptari were dealt a really nice hand by the ofa, and now they are overplaying it.

gocka it,s in your face attitude.Example how about in lazec where the shiptari built a mosque in the stretsello area.Clearly they are exceeding their authority etc & building mosques whether they are needed or not.Some of them being deliberately or if not all being sponsored by outside interests.Eg turkey,or Arabia.When are Macedonians going to learn that their country is being taken away from under our feet by a minority who doesn't care one iota & a minority hell bent on seceding away.Why the fuck are people so oblivious to what's going on.Wake up people.

LOL at him threatening to demolish gates and churches. Thats a real fair and democratic way to run things!

Isnt it funny that albanians can do and say such threatening things but if a macedonian said this the western media would make it sound like the macedonians are oppressing the poor albanians. Also i would imagine albanians would be outraged and take matters into their own hands while it seems the macedonians are ok with this joker running struga like a mafia state

Also, did you guys notice what the shiptar did? He portrayed the people from Vevcani to the people of republic srbska (nationalist serbs).
He is trying to paint macedonians as serbs who hate ethnic minorities and who still want to 'opres' the 'innoent' minorities.

This is something the shiptars will always use against us to make us look bad in western eyes

bbs what are they missing oput on crack rights .yeah then they need to sober up as to who the state belongs to.Macedonia exceeds all requirements to eu or nato membership.

Im going to put this clip here as I believe it is relevant to Macedonia's situations with the shiptar muslims

[url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxSnhLIoPGg]UKIP Multiculturalism has Failed in Europe (Must Watch) 2013 - YouTube[/url]