By Vesna Peric Zimonjic in Belgrade
Nato has put the northern Kosovo town of Mitrovica under de facto military law after rioting by Serbs hostile to the newly independent state left one UN policeman dead and forced the withdrawal of UN staff.
The violence, which erupted on Monday at the UN courthouse in the divided town, was the worst since Kosovo’s Albanian majority declared independence from Serbia last month. Nato officials said that protesters had “crossed a red line”, using Molotov cocktails and grenades. A 25-year-old Ukrainian policeman died after being caught in by a grenade blast, becoming the first UN policeman to die in Kosovo since the UN took control in 1999.
In Mitrovica, the main bridge over the river that separates the town’s Serb north from the Albanian south, was closed. French, Belgian and Spanish peacekeepers from the Nato-led force in armoured personnel carriers secured potential flashpoints and a column of US troops arrived to provide back-up. Meanwhile, all Kosovo Serb police officers were ordered to suspend normal duties.
Larry Rossin, the second-in-command of the UN mission in Kosovo, accused Serbia’s authorities of being behind the violence. “It is clear to us that the violence … was orchestrated,” he said. “We’ve never had what we could consider a clear and unambiguous denunciation of this kind of violence from the ministers or indeed any other Belgrade government official that I can think of.”
The unrest will have strengthened the hand of ultranationalists in Serbia, which vehemently rejected Kosovo’s secession, ahead of parliamentary elections on 19 May. Some 120,000 Serbs live in the north and scattered in enclaves in the south of Kosovo. Policemen, doctors and teachers in the area still follow orders and take salaries from the Serbian government.
There have been reports, carried in Zeri, Kosovo’s biggest-selling daily, that Serbia has offered to formally govern ethnic Serb areas in Kosovo. The proposal, believed to have been made at the weekend by Serbia’s Minister for Kosovo, Slobodan Samardzic, would in effective partition Europe’s newest country and is said to have been rejected by the UN mission in Kosovo (UNMIK). Mr Rossin said that he had met Mr Samardzic and was given a document meant to be “a framework for a comprehensive relationship between Serbia and UNMIK”, but would not comment on its contents.
The International Crisis Group, the Brussels-based think-tank, said in a report that the UN, Nato and the EU had been caught unprepared by Serb tactics and needed to co-ordinate better. “Serbia and Russia need to receive some very clear messages that partition of Kosovo is unacceptable”, said Sabine Freizer, director of its Europe programme.
Monday’s rioting was triggered by a UN police operation to remove Serbian protesters from a UN courthouse that they had been occupying for almost four days. In addition to the death of the policeman, another 42 officers and 22 peacekeepers were injured.
Yesterday, charred vehicles and burnt-out rubbish littered streets close to the courthouse. French peacekeepers fired warning shots into the air to disperse a group of stone-throwing protesters, but no one was hurt.
NATO tightens grip on north Kosovo, Reuters
By Matt Robinson Reuters
MITROVICA, Kosovo: NATO placed the Kosovo town of Mitrovica under de facto military law on Tuesday after riots by a Serb population hostile to independence killed one U.N. policeman and forced the withdrawal of U.N. personnel.
The NATO-led peacekeeping force KFOR and the United Nations mission ordered all local Kosovo Serb police officers to park their patrol cars and suspend normal duties.
With U.N. police already withdrawn, the order left French, Belgian and Spanish troops in control of law and order in the northern slice of Kosovo, where Serbs opposed to its February 17 secession from Serbia dominate the population.
“We have not organised martial law,” KFOR commander General Xavier Bout de Marnhac told a news conference in the Kosovo capital Pristina. “There is no intent as far as I know for installing it for the time being.”
He said Monday’s riots had “crossed a red line with the deliberate intent to kill people — you know Molotov cocktails, fragmentation grenades and direct fire” aimed at U.N. and KFOR personnel.
“We are not going to tolerate that,” the general said.
A column of U.S. troops, some in full riot gear, arrived on the south side of Mitrovica on Tuesday “to help out”, as one soldier told Reuters. They are based in southeastern Kosovo.
At the main police station, three dozen Kosovo Serb police officers carried their holdalls and flak jackets out past Belgian armoured cars guarding the perimeter to the parking lot.
“Following yesterday’s events KFOR has taken over authority for north Mitrovica and occupied the northern police station. U.N. police have ordered us to stay at home until further notice,” Captain Milija Milosevic told Reuters.
A Ukrainian police officer serving with the United Nations died overnight of injuries sustained in the riots. Polish, French and Ukrainian officers were among 42 U.N. police and 22 KFOR soldiers injured.
The violence was the worst since Kosovo’s Albanian majority declared independence from Serbia on February 17 and highlighted the risk of the new state’s partition along ethnic lines.
TENSION AND BARRICADES
Soldiers in armoured personnel carriers (APCs) secured key positions in the flashpoint town. The main bridge over the river separating the Serb north from the Albanian south was closed. Razor-wire and upturned garbage containers blocked the way.
The violence was sparked by a U.N. police operation to retake a U.N. court seized three days earlier by Serbs. The unrest has cast further doubt on the deployment in the north of a European Union rule-of-law mission in the coming two months.
It left NATO holding the line. But the 16,000-strong peace force has ruled out policing the new state, a job the EU hopes to take over from the United Nations in a rule-of-law mission.
About 120,000 Serbs remain in Kosovo among 2 million ethnic Albanians. Almost half live in the north, adjacent to Serbia and in complete isolation from Pristina. They reject the incoming EU mission as “occupiers”.
Backed by powerful ally Russia, Serbia has rejected Kosovo’s secession and its recognition by the United States and a majority of the EU’s 27 members.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov repeated his government’s view that Kosovo’s independence amounted to a “gross violation of international law”.
“We have warned that this step would inevitably have negative consequences. It happened,” he said at a joint news conference with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in Moscow.
Rice said: “We do agree that all sides should refrain from violence and that all sides should refrain from any provocation and we are sending messages to all sides.”
Serbia has offered to govern the ethnic Serb areas, senior diplomatic sources told Reuters on Tuesday, in a plan that would effectively partition the newly independent state.
The proposal was made at the weekend by Serbia’s Minister for Kosovo, Slobodan Samardzic, but was rejected by Kosovo’s United Nations administrators, they said.
The Brussels-based think tank International Crisis Group said in a report the EU and NATO would have to send a “clear message” to Serbia and Russia that they would not permit Kosovo to be divided and become “another frozen conflict”.
(Additional reporting by Branislav Krstic and Shaban Buza, and Sue Pleming in Moscow; Writing by Douglas Hamilton; Editing by Robert Woodward)
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