NATO acts on Albanian extremists

BRUSSELS, Belgium (Reuters) -- NATO has announced it is to take action to prevent any attempted link-up of extremist groups seeking a Greater Albania.

It said it plans to decrease the size of the buffer zone on the border between Kosovo and Serbia that is being used as a safe haven by ethnic Albanian paramilitaries.

The move is an effort to curb renewed violence in Kosovo, Serbia and Macedonia, a NATO official said.

NATO commanders are negotiating with Yugoslavia on possible changes to the buffer zone, he added.

Disputed zone In Presevo Valley area of south-eastern Serbia On Kosovo's eastern boundary About 160 miles south of Yugoslav capital, Belgrade Buffer zone covers three miles (five kilometres) KFOR peacekeepers have no authority in area Serb police may only carry light arms Attacks on Serbs mounted by ethnic Albanian rebels     ANALYSIS Mitrovica: 'Kosovo in microcosm'

The Yugoslav government, on good terms with NATO allies after the fall of Slobodan Milosevic, says security in Serbia's Presevo Valley is hampered by the five-kilometre (three-mile) strip along the border of Kosovo where its forces may not go.

The NATO announcement came as French peacekeepers clashed with stone-throwing Kosovo-Albanian protesters in a fresh bout of violence in the flashpoint town of Mitrovica.

It was the fourth day of violence in the ethnically divided town in which at least 20 soldiers have been wounded -- one critically -- and dozens of civilians have been hurt.

The French troops fired percussion grenades to try to disperse the crowd of about 300 mainly young protesters in Mitrovica where trouble has flared repeatedly since Kosovo came under international control in June 1999.

The protesters had gathered at the southern end of the main bridge over the Ibar River, which divides Mitrovica into Albanian and Serb-dominated sections. They were told to leave by Italian peacekeepers.

They then marched to another bridge and threw some rocks at a checkpoint of French soldiers from the NATO-led KFOR multi-national peacekeeping force.

The soldiers responded by firing percussion grenades, also known as stun grenades, which make a booming sound intended to scatter crowds in panic.

There is also the self-proclaimed but unconfirmed emergence of a "Liberation Army of the Albanians" in Macedonia.

Police in ethnically-mixed Macedonia this week arrested four Albanians for a January 22 grenade attack in which a Macedonian policeman was killed.

A Macedonian spokesman said these "extreme radical individuals are not part of an organised terrorist group, but we have unconfirmed information that they are former KLA (Kosovo Liberation Army) fighters."

The past week has also seen a sharp flare-up of violence in the Presevo Valley buffer zone.

The buffer zone was imposed on Belgrade in an agreement at the end of NATO's 78-day bombing campaign in 1999, both to separate Serb troops from incoming NATO peacekeepers and to reassure Kosovo Albanians returning to their villages.

Reformist Serbian leaders want NATO to agree to eradicate or radically narrow the strip to one or two km (a mile or less), to permit Serbian security forces to deal with the paramilitary threat, since "we are no longer enemies."

"They are making proposals, and they do want changes, and we'll talk about it," the NATO official said.

Many of the communities in the Presevo Valley have overwhelmingly ethnic Albanian populations whose numbers, NATO says, ought to be better reflected in local administration, police and key institutions.

The paramilitaries of the Presevo "liberation army," also thought to be mainly former KLA fighters numbering up to 700, say the 70,000 Albanians need their armed protection.

The NATO official said intensification of KFOR's border security in the past two months had made it "much harder for the extremists to operate with impunity."

Last Friday, about 300 of the Presevo fighters paraded before around 1,000 spectators on the outskirts of Dobrosin, a village they control which is practically within hailing distance of a major U.S. Army checkpoint.

Serbian authorities this week reported that the paramilitaries were fortifying their positions, particularly in the village of Veliki Trnovac, which they also control.

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NATO
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia

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