Attack on Kiro Gligorov

Close friends of Macedonian President Kiro Gligorov said he returned from Belgrade happy on Monday. He was optimistic. After a thaw in relations with Greece (on Monday) and the announced normalization of relations with Belgrade, the president's optimism started spreading across the country.

Then on Tuesday, October 3, at 9:45 a loud explosion rocked central Skoplje's Makedonija street. The president and Macedonia's optimism came under attack.

"The detonation was terrible. When I came to, I saw fire and I thought a gas tank had exploded. Then I saw the president's car and a man on the ground. I ran up and saw the man was dead. His brains were blown apart and there was blood all around him. A lot of blood. I covered him. Only a madman could have done that. Only a madman."

That was the story of an employee of the Bristol Hotel, a witness to the crime who fears the "madman" enough to demand anonymity. His story is part of a the mosaic being described here from the moment of the bombing to Thursday, October 5 when this article was finished:

"Macedonian President Kiro Gligorov left for work along the usual route through Vodno suburb. As usual, he was sitting in the front of the president's Mercedes next to the driver. His bodyguard was in the back seat and a BMW with security officers followed them. Using small streets and slowed down by traffic lights the two cars turned into Mito Hadzivasilev street and then into the crowded and narrow Makedonija street. "You could almost set your watch by him every day," a waiter in the Bristol Hotel said.

At around 9:45 the two cars were passing other cars parked along Makedonija street. A little Fiat was slowing traffic down. The second car they passed was filled with explosives. The Mercedes slowed down behind the Fiat and almost stopped when it got to the car bomb. Then came the blast.

Parts of the car bomb were found a hundred meters away from the site of the explosion. Local radio reported that part of the car bomb hit the fourth floor of a nearby apartment block. The windows of the president's car shattered, the front broke off and blood flooded the sidewalk.

Aleksandar Spirovski, the president's driver, was killed. A badly injured Kiro Gligorov was taken to the Skoplje University surgical hospital for five hours of neurosurgery. He also underwent an eye operation.

Spirovski was hit in the head by shrapnel, a part of the car bomb that flew straight at him. The one kilogram hunk of metal flew into the Mercedes through the right hand window, grazed Gligorov inflicting serious injuries and killed his driver. Bodyguard Ilce Teovski who was sitting in the back suffered leg injuries. He underwent surgery and is expected to go home soon. Witnesses at the Bristol Hotel (just 20 meters from the explosion) said they saw at least one man engulfed in flames. Everyone was shocked.

A statement from the Internal Affairs Ministry said the attack was a car bomb. A Citroen Ami 8, registered in Kumanovo, was used. First estimates said 20 kilos of amonal were placed in the car but that figure was later abandoned. Two sandbags were found lodged in what was the right hand side of the Citroen; they were there to aim the explosion at the president's car.

"The explosives were activated by remote control," military and police expert Zoran Petrov said categorically. He believes the attackers were 10 seconds early, too impatient to wait for Gligorov to come right next to the bomb. Petrov believes the attacker or attackers could not have been more than 30-40 meters away from the bomb since they had to see what they were aiming for.

Presidential security is the talk of the town throughout Macedonia since the attack. Gligorov's behavior was in total accord with his belief in Macedonia as an oasis of peace and that meant he couldn't just surround himself with police. Gligorov went into another extreme; he liked to walk through Skoplje; he liked the theater, he didn't use an armored car and he always sat on the front seat. He always opposed anyone who tried to make a spectacle of his appearance on the streets and no one was surprised to see the president anywhere. He warned his personal security not to overreact. People like that kind of president but never asked him to be like that because there is potential danger involved. Presidential manners like Gligorov's can be dangerous to the people and the state.

Grozdan Cvetkovski, a Macedonian expert on terrorism, told Nova Makedonija daily that security officers can not allow deviations of security measures regardless of the wishes of the president, government or any other public figure. Cvetkovski wonders whether every possible security measure was in place to protect Gligorov.

Medical experts from Athens, Belgrade, Paris, Ljubljana and London came to Skoplje. Vaso Antunovic from Belgrade was given big publicity. A statement that there is no need to move the president also got big publicity because it suggested that Gligorov was in relatively good shape. Skoplje is carefully monitoring daily statements on the president's health. Katarina Georgijeva, a saleswoman, said she was happy with the bulletins and hopes Gligorov will go back to work. "There won't be any destabilization," she added. Marika, a pensioner buying groceries said the same but she forgot her milk when asked about possible trouble.

There are no signs of fear or panic in Skoplje but everyone is bitter. The borders were closed for a while on the night of Tuesday-Wednesday. On Wednesday morning they were reopened for people coming in, getting out was slightly harder.

Part of Makedonija street has been closed off. The little Fiat is still there with all its windows shattered but that enigma was solved: two off-duty police officers were in it and they had nothing to do with the attack.

So while Skoplje is being flooded with countless versions of the attempted assassination and assumptions of who's to blame, the only person who publicly dared blame someone was once prominent politician Krste Crvenkovski. He told Nova Makedonija that the attack on Gligorov was a repeat of events from the start of this century when "Ivan Mihajlov's terrorist gangs" killed many prominent Macedonian revolutionaries on the streets of Sofia. He added that the ideologists behind the attack on the president are the "grandchildren" of Mihajlov both in Macedonia and abroad.

The attack drew almost unanimous reactions from all of Macedonia's neighbors who voiced concern for the country's internal stability. Besides "get well" messages, the Macedonian president also received messages of admiration for his wisdom as a statesman from the very people who obstructed Macedonia's bid for independence. Belgrade and Athens expressed hope that the attack won't stop the normalization of relations with Skoplje.

Macedonia's parliament speaker Stojan Andov was appointed to temporarily replace Gligorov. In his first public statement he said there is nothing in the world that will change the country's official policies.

"After everything that has happened, the question that imposes itself is whether any form of Ghandi philosophy and the policies of tolerance that Gligorov urged can survive in the Balkans," Nebojsa Jankov, a commentator for Skoplje weekly Puls told VREME. He added that the system, despite all the difficulties Macedonia faces, is stable enough to survive.

Most people in Skoplje stressed tolerance, reason and wisdom as the main characteristics of Gligorov's policies which makes him the only true statesman among Balkan politicians. Since he took the Macedonian presidency in January 1991, Gligorov faced many slippery slopes that could have turned Skoplje into Sarajevo. He always went around and managed to prove that the saying "if I were Macedonian I'd buy a rifle" isn't true.

One man in Skoplje told VREME that it is wrong to think Gligorov is firmly in control of everything in Macedonia. "He is more of a moderator. He does some things himself, sometimes he pushes others and some things he leaves to time. In any case, he is a champion of parliament and speeches. He's not one of those politicians who can stir up the masses at rallies with two or three hand picked sentences."

The reasons why he's still in politics after 50 years at an age when most if his contemporaries are writing memoirs were explained by the president prior to last year's elections. "I believe I can go on for a few more years, to continue what we started in 1990. The process that began then - preservation of peace, internal stability and international recognition - is not quite complete. The end of the Balkan war is close and there are still a lot of things to be cleared up from the past. It is my obligation, after four difficult years, to help support that course and the policies that gave results both in this country and abroad."