Scott Taylor on Macedonian -Albanian Conflict - Interview Oct 2003

This is an old interview, but a must read!

balkanalysis.com - The Security Situation: Interview with Scott Taylor

CD: On the other side, what can you tell us about the capabilities of the Macedonian military, police and intelligence-gathering units since the government was changed a year ago? Have you witnessed any changes, for better or for worse?

ST: There is no question that the Macedonian police force in particular has undergone quite a transformation, from a lot of well-intentioned but ill disciplined "volunteers" to a much more professional structure, but there is still a lot of room for improvement.

Counter insurgency ops are the most daunting for any security force, and the key to success has to be good intelligence networks. In this area, I think that the Macedonians remain seriously hampered. There is little formal cooperation with the Serbs, even though they share a mutual threat, and internally there remains a lot of mistrust as to the loyalty of several senior ranking Albanian officials within the intelligence branch. This is not a healthy situation given the current level of instability.