SKOPJE, Nov 16: Under strong international pressure the Macedonian parliament proclaimed on Friday the introduction of a new constitution that broadening rights for the volatile Balkan state’s large ethnic Albanian minority.

Macedonia’s leaders now face a new crucial step in the peace process — implementing an amnesty for ethnic Albanian rebels of the National Liberation Army (NLA), whose conflict with government forces from February to August brought the country to the brink of civil war.

The constitution was approved by a large majority, with 94 deputies voting in favour and only 14 voting against measures that form the backbone of a Western-backed peace plan signed in August.

Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski immediately gave assurances that the promised amnesty for NLA rebels would be honoured.

“Immunity will be applied to former NLA fighters who voluntarily handed over their arms (to NATO) before September 26,” Trajkovski confirmed in a letter to NATO Secretary General George Robertson, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and the head of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, Mircea Geoana.

NATO collected nearly 4,000 weapons from the rebels in an operation lasting form late August to late September.

Trajkovski confirmed the relevant authorities would be given “instructions not to arrest any person under immunity and not to continue or start new legal action (against them)”.

The only exception, Trajkovski said, would be rebels suspected by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) of committing crimes.

Until now, the amnesty has existed only as a vague political declaration. But Western leaders want concrete assurances that no prosecutions will be brought against former NLA members, except those wanted by the ICTY in the Hague.

The 15 amendments to the 1991 constitution approved on Thursday evening makes Albanian Macedonia’s second official language, gives ethnic Albanians a voice in parliament and other public bodies, and guarantees their political, religious and cultural rights.

The modified preamble to the constitution says ethnic Albanians and other minority groups are “peoples” alongside the Macedonian majority.—AFP