Macedonian government

EU mediator Peter Vanhoutte warned on Wednesday that the EU-brokered crisis agreement will be dead if the Macedonian government and opposition fail to agree on key reforms by the end of this weekend.

Macedonia is paying some 5.6 million euro to the construction firm Beton from Skopje to build a 32-metre-high complex dedicated to the famous nun on the capital's main square over the next 18 months.

Macedonian police fired tear gas at crowds of refugees on the Greek border on Friday, to deter them from trying to enter the country. Video footage showed at least several refugees were injured.

The previous day the Macedonian government declared a state of emergency on its southern and northern border following an unprecedented influx of refugees.

A group of Macedonian legislators from the parliamentary commission responsible for oversight of the secret police spent two hours at their headquarters on Tuesday but did not raise the illegal surveillance issue.

A noisy protest that started on Wednesday afternoon in front of the Macedonian government house and ended near Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski's residence gathered thousands of protesters who banged cooking pots and lids, honked whistles and sirens - and made use of pretty much everything else that makes a noise.

After an intense day of EU-mediated talks in Brussels on Wednesday, there is still no agreement between the Macedonian government and the opposition on ending the deep political crisis in the country.

There was widespread condemnation of Friday's attack on Ivanovski, a well-known and vociferous critic of the Macedonian government who runs the Maktel website and goes by the nickname 'Politiko'.

Ivanovski told BIRN that two unknown black-clad men wearing masks hit him on the head with metal bars in front of his building, but he managed to escape before suffering further injury.

The Macedonian government plane carrying Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski to Skopje from Strasbourg has made an emergency landing in Zurich over an unspecified malfunction, MIA news agency reported on Thursday.

The prime minister and the other passengers on board are safe, MIA quoted government spokesman Aleksandar Gjorgiev as saying.

Moscow believes the events in Macedonia are being "orchestrated from outside," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday.

Speaking before the Federation Council, Lavrov said the reason could be the desire to influence the Macedonian government over its refusal to join anti-Russian sanctions, and the decision to support South Stream, and then Turkish Stream pipelines.

Russia on Wednesday blamed the political crisis in Macedonia on 'outside' forces trying to exert influence on Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski over his refusal to back Western sanctions against Moscow.