By Misha Savic
Associated Press Writer
Saturday, Aug. 4, 2001; 8:45 a.m. EDT

OHRID, Macedonia –– Western mediators discussed deploying dozens of foreign police experts and officers in Macedonia to help carry out reforms if rival ethnic groups can agree on a peace plan, officials said Saturday.

The Western-mediated peace talks plodded ahead, focusing on the highly contentious issue of sharing power in law enforcement. The issue is one of the most difficult to be faced at the talks, in part because both sides are far apart.

Ethnic Albanian representatives are demanding that their sizable community – nearly a third of Macedonia's 2 million people – be proportionately represented on the force. They also want to independently elect police chiefs who would answer to local leaders rather than authorities in the capital, Skopje.

Macedonians see these demands as part of a larger ethnic Albanian strategy to ultimately carve off and break away northwestern regions of the country where the restive minority lives. They fear forever losing control of areas already overrun by the rebels.

Another hurdle is the ethnic Albanian demand that the rebels, now entrenched in the mountains and clashing with government forces, become members of the police force once a peace deal is reached.

Scattered clashes have continued throughout nearly a month of talks, leaving dozens dead and thousands displaced.

Western officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, described the talks as "very difficult" but said both sides accept that any police reform would require significant assistance from Western democracies in the form of experienced officers who would help supervise and train Macedonian police.

The officers and experts would come on top of the estimated 3,000 NATO troops that the proposed peace plan envisages to help disarm the ethnic Albanian rebels.