President of Macedonia Killed in Plane Crash

The President of Macedonia was killed in a plane crash in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Macedonian officials say the aircraft carrying Boris Trajkovski crashed in bad weather near the town of Stolac in Bosnia. The plane was en route to an international investment conference in a mountainous area in southern Bosnia. He was elected President of Macedonia in late 1999 and was praised for adopting a neutral stance in a country where tensions between Macedonians and the Albanian minority continue. Boris Trajkovski, a Catholic priest who studied theology and divinity in the United States, often supported the inclusion of Albanians in the Macedonian government. Bertie Ahern, the Prime Minister of Ireland, announced that he was supposed to welcome the Macedonian Prime Minister in Dublin, but the meeting was canceled after the news of Boris Trajkovski's death, which he called a tragedy. The Prime Minister of Macedonia returned to Skopje after the cancellation of the meeting. It is still unclear if anyone survived the incident. Macedonian government sources say President Trajkovski was part of a delegation that was to attend an economic conference in the city of Mostar in Bosnia. The Minister of Interior of Bosnia stated that bad weather may have played a role in the incident. The plane crash occurred in the 'Stolac' area near the border with Croatia and about the port of 'Dubrovnik' in the Adriatic Sea.