The election of an ethnic Albanian to parliament speaker was enough to send protesters bursting through the door. They brought masks and flying fists.
Eight people were injured, including Social Democratic leader Zoran Zaev and an ethnic Albanian lawmaker.
The conflict puts another roadblock in the quest for a working Macedonian government. In 2015 a wiretapping scandal brought the government to a halt, which the country has still not recovered from.
Earlier, an ethnic Albanian insurgency almost caused a civil war. Western diplomacy aided the crisis and brought it to an end in 2001.
