Macedonia: Farmers to Continue Protest Through Night

The farmers have gathered outside the parliament, where lawmakers are discussing their complaints of low purchasing prices for tobacco. They want the state to help them secure last year's average price of just over three euro per kilo.

The situation has become increasingly tense throughout the day, with a wider clash between protesters and the police only narrowly avoided after the farmers broke through a barricade.

Protesters have thrown stones and firecrackers at the assembly building and the police standing guard and a few minor clashes have been reported.

A heavy police presence is visible throughout the city's downtown area, and strike organisers said they plan to bring more than 10,000 protestors, though they complain that the police are stopping buses filled with farmers headed to the capital to join the rally.

“We ask for the money for our tobacco, nothing more. The government should be honest, if they cannot purchase the tobacco, then they should allow us to offer it freely on the foreign market,” a tobacco grower from the town of Prilep told Balkan Insight.

Some farmers have started fires to fight off the cold as they prepare to spend the night outside the parliament building.

Inside the parliament, the debate on the price of tobacco and the farmers' demands continues, with MPs exchanging barbs over who should be blamed for the protest and strike.

MPs from the ruling VMRO DPMNE insist that the farmers have been manupulated by the opposition Social Democrats to go out and protest, and argue that the situation is not as bad as it has been portrayed.

The tobacco growers' strike, meanwhile, has entered its fourth week. Farmers have stopped delivering tobacco and have been staging blockades of roads, railways and border crossings across the country, unsatisfied with the prices offered by tobacco buyers this year, some falling as low as one euro per kilo.

Under the current law growers are obliged to hand over their tobacco to the several big private purchasers if they want to receive state subsidiaries for following year.

But they say the purchasers are duping them by unfairly assessing the quality of their tobacco in order to pay less. They want the government to guarantee the purchase price.

They say they currently are forced to sell their tobacco for as little as one euro per kilo.

The tobacco purchasing season ends in March, and the protesters say they will hold onto their tobacco until they get better prices.