By Kole Casule - Reuters

SKOPJE – The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’s (FYROM) coalition government was heading for collapse yesterday after the main ethnic Albanian party said it was pulling out over a row on minority rights, in a new threat to Balkan stability.

The central committee of the Democratic Party of Albanians was due to meet to verify the decision by the leadership to withdraw, ending Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski’s slim parliamentary majority. “We have a serious political crisis, and it’s happening at the least opportune and hardest moment for our country,” President Branko Crvenkovski told reporters in Skopje.

FYROM’s prospects of joining NATO, a step that would keep it moving toward European Union membership, are in doubt with two weeks to go before an alliance summit at which southern neighbor Greece could veto its membership.

“This situation is unacceptable, and we should overcome it immediately,” Crvenkovski added. “We must focus on the key issue, the NATO summit and how to receive an invitation.” Albanian DPA leader Menduh Thaci said his party would quit over the Gruevski government’s failure to back laws allowing greater use of the Albanian language and flag, or to provide benefits for veterans of the 2001 Albanian guerrilla insurgency.