Legislation playing a key role in the Macedonian peace process could be delayed unless 14 kidnapped civilians are freed, said the speaker of the Macedonian parliament, Stojan Andov.
Andov, who met with families of the kidnap victims, said he could not start the legislative process for the last phase of the constitutional reform package agreed between the Macedonian government and ethnic Albanian rebels unless the kidnappers freed their hostages.
The internationally-brokered peace deal envisages a reform package aimed at ending a rebel uprising which began in February and saw a NATO arms-collecting mission move into Macedonia at the end of August.
The civilians were captured in late July around the northern flashpoint town of Tetovo, when ethnic Albanian rebels forced Macedonians from their village homes.
"The fact that the civilians who were captured are not free shows that there is not yet peace in Macedonia," he said.
He went on to say that the armed ethnic Albanian National Liberation Army (NLA), "was not completely dismantled and is still active and holding civilians."
Ethnic Albanians claimed that the movement was disbanded on September 27, the day NATO said it had successfully collected around 4,000 arms from the rebels.
NATO also announced the deployment of a follow-up mission to Macedonia which will see 1,000 troops in Macedonia for three months to protect international observers monitoring the implementation of the peace agreement.
Andov, who is seen as a Macedonian radical, previously suspended the work of parliament for two days at the start of September because he said peace conditions were not being met -- SKOPJE (AFP)
