NATO presses for Kosovo peace

Four Macedonian soldiers have died in a week along the Kosovo border     WEB EXCLUSIVE Chris Burns: Ethnic strife flares again in Balkans

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia -- NATO is making a renewed diplomatic effort to end ethnic fighting that has spilled out of Kosovo and into Macedonia and the rest of Serbia.

Special NATO envoy Pieter Feith has indicated he is moving closer to a cease fire deal between ethnic Albanian guerrillas and government security forces in Serbia's Presevo Valley.

In recent weeks there has been an upsurge in violence along Kosovo's boundaries with both southern Serbia and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

Feith held talks on Sunday with a Serbian delegation led by Deputy Prime Minister Nebojsa Covic in the town of Bujanovac.

Afterwards he said he would meet the Albanian side again when the moment was appropriate.

Feith held talks with both sides on Saturday hoping both the rebels and Yugoslav troops would agree to a ceasefire in a buffer zone separating Kosovo from the rest of Serbia, Yugoslavia's main republic.

VIDEO CNN's Chris Burns reports on the increasingly violent conflicts between Macedonians and ethnic Albanians Play video (QuickTime, Real or Windows Media)

But he emerged without an agreement from the ethnic Albanians after three hours of talks.

The main stumbling block for the rebels was NATO's decision to send Yugoslav forces into the buffer zone near the Macedonian border to curb weapons smuggling to ethnic Albanian guerrillas operating there.

Ethnic Albanians, operating in Macedonia, spelled out their demands, calling for constitutional changes that would define the country as "a state of two constituent peoples" -- Macedonian and Albanian -- and grant broad rights and privileges to its ethnic Albanian minority.

Macedonian officials have promised to carry out social reform programmes to help improve the lives of its ethnic Albanian minority.

Foreign Minister Srgan Kerim said carrying out social and economic reforms for the minorities is the answer to extremism.

A Macedonian policeman killed when his car was blown up near the Kosovo border was buried on Saturday.

Goran Stojanovski was the fourth Macedonian serviceman to be killed in a week. A Serb police officer was also killed on Friday.

Macedonia has sealed its borders with Kosovo - key routes for supplies into the province -- after a series of attacks on border villages.

The Macedonian Government has called for extra protection from NATO and a buffer zone similar to the one enforced in southern Serbia to be introduced along the Macedonian-Kosovo border.

But NATO Secretary-General Lord Robertson said: "I don't think another ground safety zone, frankly, is the answer."

"Robust patrolling" of the Macedonian border by KFOR was NATO's preferred solution to preventing infiltrations, he said.

In another apparent effort to ease tensions, Yugoslavia released 94 ethnic Albanian prisoners who were rounded up during former President Slobodan Milosevic's crackdown in Kosovo.

The release brought the number of ethnic Albanians freed last week to 150, but Yugoslavia still holds about 500 such prisoners.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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Macedonian Government
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
KFOR
OSCE
United Nations
NATO

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