PRISTINA (AP) - NATO’s top military body toured Kosovo’s institutions yesterday and inspected developments in the province after the United Nations approved talks to resolve the province’s status. NATO’s Military Committee — made up of the permanent representatives of the 26 member nations — arrived in Kosovo Tuesday at a time when the alliance is considering its own future role in the province. “NATO’s presence is still vital for emerging local and regional institutions to take root,” said Gen. Raymond Henault, chairman of the committee.

BELGRADE (Reuters) - Serbia has arrested nine policemen for the 1999 murder of 48 Kosovo Albanians found buried with hundreds of others in a mass grave near Belgrade, a Serbian court official said yesterday. It was the first arrest linked to the discovery in 2001 of pits filled with the remains of more than 800 victims of the 1998-99 Kosovo war. The biggest was in Batajnica, near the capital Belgrade, in a police compound.

Thirteen people from Bangladesh, India and Pakistan are seeking asylum in the UN protectorate of Kosovo, the UN refugee agency said yesterday. “Ten people from Bangladesh, two from India and one from Pakistan arrived on a flight from Istanbul on Monday. They have sought asylum in Kosovo,” said Shpend Halili, a spokesman for the UNHCR in Kosovo. “It is an unusual case and a new experience for Kosovo,” which has no system for dealing with such cases, Halili told AFP. (AFP)

A privately operated Turkish airliner was forced to make an emergency landing in Ankara yesterday after its cockpit window cracked in midair, a spokeswoman for the company said. The MD-83, operated by Fly Air, was en route from the country’s biggest city Istanbul to the northern city of Trabzon with 124 passengers aboard when it had to redirect to Ankara. Nobody was injured during the incident, the spokeswoman said. (AFP)

More than 40,000 Romanian teachers went on a two-hour strike yesterday to call for higher wages and more money for schools. The teachers are demanding a minimum monthly salary equivalent to 250 euros ($300) per month. Salaries are now about 3 million lei (75 euros; $100) — about a third of the average monthly wage in Romania. (AP)

A Bosnian Croat, accused of leading a 1993 attack on a Bosnian Muslim village in which at least 16 civilians were killed, pleaded guilty to charges at the international court for war crimes in The Hague yesterday. Ex-militia commander Ivica Rajic pleaded guilty to four of 10 counts, including willful killing and wanton destruction. (Reuters)