DONJA GRADINA, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AFP) - More than 3,000 people gathered here yesterday to mark the 60th anniversary of the dismantlement of Croatia's most notorious World War II death camp, where hundreds of thousands of people, mostly Serbs, were killed by the country's pro-Nazi regime. Bosnian-Serb President Dragan Cavic and his Serbian counterpart Boris Tadic also attended the ceremony. The Jasenovac camp complex, known as Croatia's Auschwitz, was set up in 1941 by the country's Nazi-allied Ustasha regime.

BELGRADE (AP) - An independent Kosovo would be a threat to Balkan stability, the Serbian prime minister warned in comments published Saturday, saying the contested province should instead gain «extended autonomy.» «We are decisively against any form of independence, conditional or unconditional,» Vojislav Kostunica told the Vecernje Novosti daily. «Independence (for Kosovo) would not be a compromise and undoubtedly... would threaten the achieved stability in the region.»

Several thousand barrels of crude oil that spilled into Lake Ataturk in eastern Turkey caught fire, causing damage to the environment before being brought under control, local officials said yesterday. A crack in the pipeline from the oil-producing region of Batman in the east to an terminal in Dortyol in the south was reported late Wednesday in the province of Sanliurfa, officials said. The crude then spilled into Ataturk, the country's artificial lake. (AFP)

Three people were killed while at least a dozen were missing and feared dead when a bus plunged into a river from a bridge in northern Serbia after colliding with a truck, police said Saturday. The bus, carrying some 25 passengers, collided with the truck trying to overtake another vehicle on the opposite lane of the bridge over the river Tisa, on the road to the northern town Novi Sad late Friday, police said. (AFP)

The first generation of Bosnian-Serb army recruits asked to swear loyalty to Bosnia, rather than just the Serb part of the country, refused Saturday to take the oath of allegiance and booed the national anthem. As part of the country's military reform, more than 500 recruits were asked to swear loyalty to Bosnia-Herzegovina. But when an officer read the oath to be repeated, the recruits changed the last line and swore loyalty to the Bosnian-Serb entity of Republika Srpska. (AP)