MACEDONIA: GERMAN TROOPS ARRIVE IN TETOVO TO JOIN UP WITH NATO FORCES TO DIARM THE REBELS

Record ID: 648078

  • Title: MACEDONIA: GERMAN TROOPS ARRIVE IN TETOVO TO JOIN UP WITH NATO FORCES TO DIARM THE REBELS
  • Date: 31st August 2001
  • Summary: TETOVO, MACEDONIA (AUGUST 31, 2001) (REUTERS) 1. SLV/SV TRUCKS ARRIVING AT ARABINOVO BASE (11 SHOTS) 1.16 2. MCU (German) ERNST WILHELM-HARDER, COMMANDER OF GERMAN TROOPS FOR OPERATION ESSENTIAL HARVEST SPEAKING 1.38 3. SLV EXTERIOR OF ARABINOVO BASE 1.44 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
  • Embargoed: 15th September 2001 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: TETOVO, MACEDONIA
  • Country: Macedonia
  • Reuters ID: LVACCVB096YM4JO91CU2M8JT4EXY
  • Story Text: Hundreds more German troops have arrived in Tetovo,
    Macedonia, to join up with existing NATO forces in it's effort
    to disarm the rebels.



    The troops who arrived on Friday (August 31) will join
    the existing German forces who arrived on Wednesday (August
    29, 2001).

    The German parliament, recalled from its summer recess for
    the special session on Macedonia, had voted to deploy up to
    500 troops to join NATO's mission to disarm rebels in a 30-day
    mission.

    The vote was a minor coup for German Chancellor Gerhard
    Schroeder, who just a week ago faced the embarrassing
    possibility of his first parliamentary defeat in three years
    in power after a group of deputies from his Social Democrats
    threatened to vote no.

    Before the vote in the parliament Schroeder said: "We as
    Germans are interested in stability prevailing in this region
    of Europe."
    While in most NATO states the government alone decides
    whether to deploy troops, Germany, still acutely conscious of
    its militaristic past, needs parliament to approve any
    mission.

    The first German soldiers to be deployed arrived in
    Macedonia on Wednesday (August 29) night to join the NATO
    force already collecting weapons from ethnic Albanian
    fighters.

    The Germans will be stationed near Skopje and Tetovo and housed in barracks that are already being used by German forces serving with the NATO mission in neighbouring Kosovo. Germany already has about 5,000 troops in Kosovo and 2,000 in Bosnia.


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