Macedonia's president was today killed when his plane crashed in thick fog in a mountainous part of southern Bosnia.
Boris Trajkovski, president since 1999, was flying to an international investment conference in the Bosnian city of Mostar when the executive jet dropped off radar screens. Police said they had found the plane's wreckage but no sign of survivors.
On hearing the news, Branko Crvenkovski, Macedonia's prime minister, cancelled a meeting in Dublin with his Irish counterpart, Bertie Ahern. He had been expected to submit Macedonia's application to join the European Union but instead flew back to Skopje.
Although his role was largely ceremonial, Mr Trajkovski presided over a Nato-brokered peace deal in 2001 that prevented armed clashes with ethnic Albanian guerillas in the mountains bordering Kosovo turning into a full-blown civil war.
Mark Laity, a Nato official who advised the president, told Reuters that no Macedonian was more important in stopping the slide to civil war. "He was controversial and people often attacked him, but in the end he was a person who could always be relied on to do the right thing," he said.
Europe minister Denis MacShane praised the even-handed spirit of compromise he brought to the job. "Trajkovski was one of the best leaders in the western Balkans," he writes today in his Guardian Unlimited political diary.
"He avoided the populist nationalism that is the off-the-shelf politics in the region and instead worked with the Albanian community in Macedonia to show that compromise politics were possible.
"He was keen to see Macedonia turn towards Europe and he put in place key figures to promote Macedonia's EU aspirations. The best tribute to his memory is to keep insisting that the western Balkans chooses the European road as their way out of the terrible heritage of the Milosevic years," Mr MacShane adds.
The foreign secretary, Jack Straw, said he was saddened to hear of the president's death.
"President Trajkovski played a key role in resolving the inter-ethnic conflict which threatened Macedonia's unity," he said. "Thanks to his efforts Macedonia is firmly on the path to Euro-Atlantic integration. The UK remains committed to helping Macedonia along this path."
An English speaker and ordained Methodist minister, Mr Trajkovski was viewed in the west as a young leader with an international outlook and an ability to build contacts abroad.
He specialised in commercial and employment law and once headed the legal department of a construction company.
The mountainous Balkan region, combined with difficult winter weather conditions, can be hazardous for air travel.
In April 1996, a member of Bill Clinton's cabinet, commerce secretary Ron Brown, was among 35 people killed when a US air force passenger jet crashed into a mountain in the same area.
The weather in the area was today said to be poor and it prompted Albania's prime minister, Fatos Nano, to cancel his own flight to the conference.
Mr Trajkovski is survived by his wife and their son and daughter.