Editor Milaim Shefkiu writes that the latest protests in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia showed the instability of this country. “As far as the police intervention is concerned, the Gruevski government is uncompromising against Albanians and is using violence and deploying troops just like Milosevic did in Kosovo in the 1990s. In this respect, the government in Skopje is using double standards when it comes to maintaining calmness. When Macedonian citizens protested after the killing of a Macedonian youth by an Albanian peer, police were very restrained despite the fact that protesters were very aggressive and even attacked and demolished properties belonging to Albanians in Skopje. When Albanians protested against the arbitrary decisions in the Monstra case, the Ministry of Interior Affairs used the entire state apparatus, and teargas and shock bombs used by police resembled the civil war in Syria. This proves once again that Albanians in Macedonia are considered second-class citizens, whose rights to unbiased trials, the use of official language, employment and protests are denied. Albanians in Macedonia make up over 30 percent of the demographic structure but the use of Albanian language is limited only to municipalities where they make up 20 percent. If rights are global, then one has to come to Kosovo, where Serbs make up only five percent of the population, but their language is used officially throughout Kosovo. European standards should be applied the same throughout the Balkans, not only in regions where there are Serbs or Macedonians”.