NATO raids flashpoint Kosovo town, refugee concern mounts

Violent attacks in danger of becoming ethnic cleansing, senior commander says

An ethnic Albanian girl walks by the ruins of an ancient Serb Orthodox monastery in the southern Kosovo town of Prizren.

By Fredrik Dahl - Reuters

PRISTINA - NATO troops raided apartment blocks in a flashpoint Kosovo town yesterday after two days of serious violence the alliance has blamed mainly on Albanian hardliners bent on driving out Serbs.

The raids on three high-rise blocks inhabited mainly by ethnic Albanians followed the killing of a sniper in Kosovska Mitrovica by NATO troops on Thursday after they came under fire.

“A sniper in Mitrovica was shot and killed by KFOR soldiers,” Lieutenant-Colonel Jim Moran told Reuters, declining to reveal the sniper’s nationality.

Germany, France and Denmark sent reinforcements to quell the violence which has killed 31 people and driven nearly a thousand Serbs from their homes in what some say is a deliberate drive to wipe out isolated Serb pockets before Kosovo is carved up.

The UN refugee agency expressed concern that the bloodshed might spark a new exodus of minority Serbs. UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond said it “threatens to undo years of international efforts” to reconcile Orthodox Slavs and Muslim Albanians. “There are not many (ethnic) minorities left in Kosovo — 220,000 have fled since 1999. We don’t want to see any more go,” he told a news conference in Geneva.

In Belgrade, some 15,000 Serbs rallied and demanded that the United Nations halt “Albanian terrorists.”

Germany decided to send 600 more troops to strengthen the 18,500-strong KFOR peacekeeping mission. They will start arriving today, raising the German contingent to 3,800.

France pledged to send an extra 400 troops, most of them expected to arrive today, and Denmark promised an additional 100 soldiers. About 150 British troops landed in Kosovo early yesterday, the first of a promised 750 soldiers, a Defense Ministry spokesman said in London.

About 150 US troops and 80 Italian Carabinieri arrived on Thursday. NATO-led peacekeepers in neighboring Bosnia said they had sent an extra 160 Italian and British troops to Kosovo.

But some fear permanent damage has been inflicted over the past 48 hours on the post-1999 war resettlement program.

“Albanians are trying to cleanse the Serbs and create a fait accompli before any talks,” said a Western source on condition of anonymity. “Anyone with political experience can see that.”

[“This kind of activity, which essentially amounts to ethnic cleansing, cannot go on,” Adm. Gregory Johnson, commander of NATO forces in southern Europe, was quoted as saying by The Associated Press. “That’s why we came here in the first place.”]