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Kosova Refugees Say Serbs Attacked Convoy

By Linda Spahia

KUKES, Albania (Reuters) - Kosova refugees arriving in Albania late Wednesday told Reuters a column of vehicles they were travelling in was attacked by Serb aircraft and at least six people were and many injured.

``The planes were flying very low and were Serbian MiGs,'' said a 23-year-old man. He and more than 10 other refugees said the attack took place at 1:30 p.m. (1130 GMT) between Krusa and Pirane on the Djakovica-Prizen road in western Kosova.

All said they were attacked by Serbian planes.

The refugees, among more than 4,000 that crossed into Albania near Kukes -- 250 km (150 miles) north of Tirana -- Wednesday, were clearly in shock and gave identical accounts of the time and location of the attack, saying it took place about six km (four miles) from Prizren.

The flood of refugees from Kosova increased dramatically three weeks ago when NATO began air raids on Yugoslav military targets in an attempt to halt what it said was a Serb campaign of ethnic cleansing in the troubled province.

Yugoslavia accused NATO of bombing a convoy near the village of Meja, a few kilometers from Djakovica, saying the alliance's missiles killed at least 70 ethnic Albanian refugees. It was not clear if the two incidents were related.

Djakovica and Prizren are about 30 km (18 miles) apart.

In Washington, the Pentagon said NATO was investigating reports that Serb troops or police attacked refugees in a Yugoslav military convoy. A spokesman said later Kosova refugees told U.N. workers in Albania they were attacked by Serb planes.

The young man, who declined to give his name, said his brother had lost a leg and was left behind after the attack, during which low-flying aircraft dropped bombs on the convoy, destroying two tractors.

``If he gets well, we will send him to Albania, otherwise you will find him in the Djakovica cemetery,'' he was told by Serb soldiers who piled the dead and wounded in the same truck.

``We were bombed in the vicinity of Prizren. Serb soldiers came with cameras and filmed the blood and the dead and told us to go and say that NATO bombed you,'' said Sabrie Hasani, 45, from Drenica.

Some of the refugees, from Skenderaj, said they had been on the road for three days when the attack occurred.

``Whenever we sat down to rest, the Serbs told us to move on,'' said one. A woman said one of the planes was painted black and the other white.

The incident cut the refugee convoy in two. Those who arrived during the afternoon came on tractors. All those who came later Wednesday were on foot.

The refugees' accounts appeared to support a statement issued earlier Wednesday by the Albanian opposition Democratic Party, which cited information given to the leader of the local council in Kukes, Shefqet Bruka.

``A number of refugees coming from Kosova today testify that somewhere in the vicinity of Prizren, Serbian helicopters bombed and killed at least 40 people and wounded others,'' the party said in a statement.

Other refugees streaming across the border in cars and tractors from Skenderaj, Prizren and Drenica, said they had been used as human shields near an ammunition store after being turned back by the Serbs two weeks ago.

``They put us next to an army ammunition depot where we stood for a week,'' said Vlora Aliaj, 23.

 

Bodies Lie On Kosova Road; As Usual Serbs Blame NATO

BELGRADE - Yugoslavia said NATO missiles killed at least 64 people Wednesday in two attacks on Kosova Albanian refugees, but the alliance said it had only hit military vehicles and the Serbs were to blame for the bloodshed.

``When the planes came, they told us to get down but by then it was too late,'' said one man, speaking among abandoned tractors and scattered belongings on a road in Western Kosova.

Pentagon spokesman Ken Bacon said NATO commander Gen. Wesley Clark had received reports that ``after the convoy was hit, military people got out and attacked civilians.'' He said the incident was being investigated.

Bacon said Serb military vehicles were at either end of the convoy with civilians in between, and that allied pilots were sure they attacked only the military vehicles.

``I have talked to Gen. Clark,'' Bacon said. ``He has received reports from the pilots that they believe they hit only military vehicles ... he has also received verbal reports that after the convoy was hit, military people got out and attacked civilians. He believes that there may be some (film) imagery of that and he is trying to get it.''

Eighteen bodies, some of them missing limbs, were still at the scene when reporters were escorted there by Serbian officials. Investigative judge Milenka Momcilovic said 20 people had been killed and four injured.

The Serb-run Media Center in the Kosova regional capital Pristina said 44 people had been killed in a separate attack on another convoy of refugees on the road between Djakovica and Prizren to the south.

The latest carnage in the war-stricken Yugoslav province came as European Union leaders backed a U.N. peace plan for Kosova, saying NATO's three-week-old bombing campaign would be suspended in Belgrade acted immediately to meet key demands.

A draft statement said these were: an immediate end to the use of violence; withdrawal of all forces; deployment of an international security force and the return of all refugees.

``(The EU leaders) stress that it is now up to the Yugoslav authorities to fully accept the international demands and begin immediately with their implementation.''

But in Belgrade, where Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic made his first public appearance since bombing began on March 24, his guest Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko gave little hope of any change in Yugoslav's stand.

Lukashenko told reporters he had asked Milosevic if any compromise was possible in Belgrade's clash with the West.

``He gave me the outer limit beyond (which) he and his people cannot go ... Yugoslavia is ready to accept civilian observers from the United Nations or representatives of other countries. Civilian observers, not army or police teams,'' Lukashenko said.

``Those representatives must be from the countries which are not involved in recent NATO bombing of Yugoslavia..,'' he said.

Germany, which holds the EU's revolving presidency, had also launched its own peace plan which involved suspended air strikes for 24 hours if Milosevic started pulling troops out of Kosova.

German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said Russia, which has strongly opposed the bombing campaign, had ``almost fully agreed'' to his plan though it still had concerns over the make-up of an international peacekeeping force for Kosova.

The United States said it would not even discuss a bombing pause until Yugoslavia accepted all Western demands.

White House spokesman Joe Lockhart reiterated the U.S. insistence that any peacekeeping force for Kosova be under NATO command -- a condition Russia has repeatedly rejected.

NATO says it is targeting only military, or military-related sites in its air campaign, but has admitted that its missiles have missed three times.

The strike on the train Monday appeared to be the most lethal, with Yugoslavia's Beta news agency saying Wednesday the death toll was 14 but could be as high as 50.

``The total number of killed confirmed so far is 14,'' Nebojsa Stojcic, an investigative judge was quoted as saying. He added that that 10 bodies have been identified so far, including a 5-year-old child.

Stojcic said that the higher casualty figure was based on the numbers of bodies and body parts found on the site, registered missing people, personal belongings and other evidence gathered from the wreckage of the train.

Clark has apologized for the attack, saying it was an ''uncanny accident'' that the train crossed a bridge during an attack.

In Paris, French television showed film of smoke rising over villages in southwestern Kosova and said ethnic Albanian guerrillas were being routed there.

``I will not admit that we have lost territory. This is strategic. We are retreating to protect our civilians,'' one guerrilla of the Kosova Liberation Army told the French television reporter.

Air raid sirens sounded in Belgrade again Wednesday night and in the Kosova regional capital Pristina three loud explosions were heard after dark.

``Aggressor aircraft are flying over Pristina again tonight,'' the official news agency Tanjug said.

Earlier it reported that NATO planes had targeted a hydroelectric plant and hit a company building five times in overnight raids. A railway bridge linking Belgrade to the Adriatic port of Bar in Montenegro was slightly damaged.

NATO has intensified air raids this week and asked for an extra 300 aircraft from the United States to bring its air force up to some 1,100 planes.

Belgrade Endures Heaviest Attack So Far--Residents

BELGRADE (Reuters) - Belgrade residents said the Yugoslav capital was undergoing its heaviest bombing so far early Thursday with the sound of massive explosions and anti-aircraft fire resounding throughout the city.

Five or six blasts were reported at about 1:30 a.m. (1130 GMT Wednesday). Studio B television said NATO planes hit a military barracks in the Rakovica area of the city but there were no other details of what had been hit.

The smell of burning was reported from the east of Belgrade and some residents said they believed many NATO warplanes were taking part in the raids.

The attacks were said to be continuing. Weather conditions, which have hampered NATO in the past, were described as good with clear skies.

The state news agency Tanjug reported several other attacks, especially in the south of Yugoslavia, in the early hours of Thursday.

The Zapadna Morava bridge in the village of Jasika was reported to have been destroyed by two missiles just after midnight.

Tanjug said there were other attacks in Krusevac, Cacak, Kragujevac, Valjevo and Uzice.

NATO has intensified air raids this week and asked for an extra 300 aircraft from the United States to bring its air fleet up to 1,100 planes.

Wednesday, Serb officials accused NATO of killing at least 64 people in missile attacks on columns of Kosova Albanian refugees.

German Defense Minister Rudolf Scharping said Serb artillery had opened fire on the refugees and had then blamed NATO. The Pentagon said it was investigating reports that Serb forces were responsible.

NATO Secretary-General Javier Solana was quoted Thursday as saying the alliance was hopeful of resolving differences with Russia and seeing its conditions for the bombing of Yugoslavia enshrined in a U.N. resolution.

Solana said in an interview with Britain's Financial Times that bringing Russia ``back on board'' over the Kosova issue was a priority for NATO.

A meeting of the Group of Eight -- the world's leading industrialized democracies including Russia -- could take place within a few days, possibly followed by a meeting of the U.N. Security Council, he said.

Explosions shake Belgrade, NATO hits Serbian TV transmitter

BELGRADE, April 15 (AFP) - Six powerful explosions shook Belgrade shortly after 01:30 a.m. Thursday (2330 GMT), an AFP correspondent said.

Earlier, Tanjug said a Serbian RTS television transmitter southwest of Belgrade had been struck by a NATO missile shortly after midnight.

The transmitter located on Mount Ovcar, 160 kilometres (100 miles) from the capital, was hit at 00:15 a.m. (2215 GMT), the report said.

RTS broadcasts from the Ovcar transmitter were cut off, the agency said.

NATO strike may have provoked Yugoslav army troops to attack refugees: Pentagon

WASHINGTON, April 14 (AFP) - As many as 75 people were reported killed Wednesday in air strikes in western Kosova that Belgrade charged hit a column of refugees but which NATO said were directed at Yugoslav military vehicles.

NATO's top military commander was investigating reports that Serb troops or police attacked the refugees in reprisal after NATO aircraft struck a convoy of military vehicles, the Pentagon said.

Pilots reported attacking only military vehicles and not a column of tractors and other vehicles carrying refugees east of the city of Djakovica, Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon said.

General Wesley Clark, NATO's supreme commander, "also has received verbal reports of the possibility that after the convoy was hit military people got out and attacked civilians," Bacon said.

The military convoy and the refugee column were believed to be in close proximity, according to Bacon.

"Whether it was two convoys on the same road, or one convoy ... we don't know yet," he told reporters.

An unmanned reconnaissance aircraft may have taken pictures of the incident, which Clark was trying to obtain to find out what happened, he said.

"We have what General Clark believes to be the facts, but he says the whole thing is under review and he's waiting to see if we do in fact have some sort of film, possibly from the Predator, that would show more clarity on what happened," Bacon said.

Serb reports described the column as a 100-vehicle caravan of farm tractors and other vehicles loaded with ethnic Albanians returning from the border area.

Air Force Major General Charles Wald, a combat pilot who has flown missions in Bosnia, said the pilots were trained to recognize military targets for the air and would have been able to distinguish farm tractors from military vehicles.

In a separate incident, refugees reaching Albania said Yugoslav planes attacked a group of 600 refugees, many of them women and children, on the road from the Prizren to the border town of Kukes, Albania, Bacon told reporters.

They said the aircraft hit two tractors, but it was unclear whether there were any casualties, Bacon said.

The Pentagon said the NATO attack occurred shortly after 3:30 p.m. local time east of Djakovica in western Kosova.

Serb reports said air strikes occurred at 1 p.m. (1100 GMT) and between 2.20 p.m. and 3 p.m. (1220 and 1300 GMT) near the village of Meha.

An AFP reporter who arrived at the village two hours after the reported bombing said he saw 20 dead and four injured in one of the two bombings. He was present while an investigating judge was counting the bodies.

Nebojsa Vujovic, Yugoslav foreign ministry spokesman, put the death toll at 75 dead and 25 injured.

"NATO bombs created a new humanitarian catastrophe and tragedy, bombing the two convoys of refugees returning to their homes" from the border with Albania, he said.

A 14-year-old boy, Muharem Alija from a nearby village Pace, told the AFP reporter that "grenades were falling from the planes."

Several bodies, including those of a woman and a girl, were seen lying at the roadside, alongside vehicles and tractors packed with personal belongings. One male victim appeared to have been burned to death and six victims were apparently pulled out from the ruins of a house.

The reported attacks come two days after a NATO bomb mistakenly struck a train crossing a railroad bridge. The Yugoslav BETA news agency Wednesday said that attack killed ten people, injured 16, and another 17 people were missing.

"If it turns out that people were killed, that is an other example of very cynically using displaced persons or refugees as human shields," said Brian Atwood, head of the US Agency for International Development (AID).

"It's the result of a very cynical policy of using human being as shields," Atwood told reporters Wednesday.

But if the Yugoslav charges prove true, Wednesday's incident would be the largest known loss of civilian life in a NATO air strike since the 22-day-old NATO air war against Yugoslavia began.

NATO has gone to extraordinary lengths to avoid civilian casualties in this campaign, relying heavily on precision guided munitions to minimize what the US military euphemistically calls collateral damage.

Strict rules of engagement require them to abort their mission if not absolutely certain of their targets, said Wald, deputy director for operations of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

"Unless there's 100 percent assurance that what you're hitting is a military target -- and I've been through this for years over there -- you don't drop," he said.

NATO Campaign May Last Into Summer

WASHINGTON (AP) - NATO's air campaign in Yugoslavia could stretch into the summer, U.S. officials suggested Wednesday, as the first Apache attack helicopters began arriving in Albania as part of a major buildup of forces.

Clinton administration officials, in closed-door meetings with congressional officials, have signaled NATO is poised to continue the air campaign for several weeks longer, possibly into midsummer if Serb forces continue fighting ethnic Albanians in Kosova.

Army Gen. Henry Shelton, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told lawmakers that while bombing has been hampered by weather, conditions usually improve in the Balkans in June and July, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity. That would make it longer than the U.S.-led, six-week Gulf War in 1991.

``This is going to be a sustained campaign,'' said one lawmaker who was briefed.

President Clinton dispatched his budget chief, Jacob Lew, to the Capitol to meet with Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., on how to pay for the Balkan fighting.

Lott declined to be specific but said the administration wants to use the expected federal surplus to pay the $4 billion to $8 billion cost of the entire campaign, including caring for refugees.

``Obviously, that's not what we'll get our members to go along with,'' Lott said. Otherwise, he said, ``I didn't see any real hot buttons there.''

Many Republicans seem eager to cover the military costs with the surplus but want relief efforts financed from cuts in other, non-military programs.

In the move to bolster the NATO force, the Apaches began arriving in Albania, and the Clinton administration was preparing within days to call up of at least several thousand military reservists and deploy 300 more warplanes to join NATO airstrikes. That would bring the total air power to 1,000 aircraft - two-thirds of them American.

Maj. Gen. Charles Wald, a strategic planner for the Joint Chiefs, called the massive buildup and intensifying air campaign against Serb forces ``an indication of our resolve that we're going to see this thing through to the end.''

Some 82 fresh U.S. warplanes already ordered to Europe also began arriving Wednesday, including 24 F-16 jet-fighters, four A-10 ``tank killer'' attack airplanes, 15 Marine EA-6B radar jammers to interfere with Serb air defenses and 38 refueling tankers. The Pentagon said Serbs fired dozens of surface-to-air missiles at allied planes Wednesday night in the biggest show yet of enemy anti-aircraft fire.

U.S. Army Gen. Wesley Clark, commander of NATO, has requested the number of Apaches be doubled to 48, U.S. defense officials said. That would mean adding several thousand U.S. soldiers to 2,500 now in Albania to operate the Apaches and multiple rocket launchers that would be used to clear a strike path for the helicopters.

No decisions have been made on increasing the Apache force, authorizing deployment of 300 more U.S. planes and calling up reserves, the Pentagon said.

Military leaders at NATO and the Pentagon, meanwhile, accused Yugoslav forces of attacking and killing ethnic Albanian civilians Wednesday in retaliation after a NATO airstrike hit a Serb military convoy in southern Kosova. The Serbs blamed NATO for up to 64 civilian deaths, saying allied aircraft struck refugees in a convoy instead.

Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon said the incident happened Wednesday afternoon local time east of Djakovica in southern Kosova, the same area in which the Serbs reported that NATO bombs struck the refugee convoy.

Bacon said NATO was still investigating, but NATO pilots reported they hit only military vehicles in the convoy, which was apparently in the vicinity of a separate convoy of Kosovar refugees.

Clark told Bacon he had received ``verbal reports of the possibility'' that after military vehicles in the refugee convoy were hit, ``military people got out and ... began to attack civilians in the middle of the convoy.''

Bacon said Clark told him there may be reconnaissance imagery available to show what happened. ``We don't know what the full facts are,'' the spokesman said.

In a separate development, Bacon said U.N. relief workers told NATO that 600 women and children entering Albania reported being attacked Wednesday by Yugoslav aircraft. The refugees had been traveling between Prizen in Kosova to Kukes, Albania, when two tractors in their convoy were struck by Serb aircraft about two hours before they arrived at the border, Bacon said. The Pentagon didn't know what type of aircraft was involved or whether refugees were killed.

On the diplomatic front, the Clinton administration cautiously welcomed a German proposal that could result in a bombing pause - but only after Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic begins withdrawing his forces from Kosova.

The plan announced in Bonn on Wednesday by the Foreign Ministry offers Milosevic a 24-hour suspension of NATO airstrikes when his forces begin withdrawing.

NATO would ``permanently suspend'' airstrikes once the pullout is completed, and a U.N.-authorized military force would deploy to Kosova to protect returning refugees. The province would be placed under U.N. administration until a permanent peace settlement.

Previously, NATO had been pushing for a NATO-led peacekeeping force.

White House press secretary Joe Lockhart called the plan constructive and said it would not include halting attacks before Milosevic meets NATO's demands.

Kosova Refugees Tell Tragic Stories

By MORT ROSENBLUM AP Special Correspondent

KUKES, Albania (AP) - By now, a half-million tragic stories later, the ugly picture is getting steadily uglier: It is one of Serb terror and murder ripping deep Albanian roots from Kosova soil.

As NATO pursues its relentless campaign in the air, Serbs probe the Albanian border and pepper a no-man's land with mines to show they are masters on the ground.

``They are now everywhere,'' wailed Zade Haridinaj, among at least 2,000 refugees who crossed Wednesday from Drenica, a last redoubt of the Kosova Liberation Army. Her group hid in the mountains for a month before riding a tractor convoy to Albania.

``The last thing we saw was Serbs beating our men to death, maybe 300 or 400 of them, including boys over 14,'' she said. Another 4,000 refugees, mostly women, were following on foot, she said. Even with tractors, the trip took three days. Five children died of exposure in her cluster of tractors.

Her 84-year-old mother-in-law, Hafize Haridinaj, described how Serb paramilitary units shot to death 150 men suspected of KLA ties on March 27 in the nearby village of Izmic. Zade said her brother was among them.

Many in the group said Serbs placed their tanks and artillery near refugee convoys, apparently to discourage NATO pilots from bombing them.

On Tuesday, Naser Berisha, 36, was among nearly 4,000 refugees who straggled into the Albanian border town of Kukes. They had hidden for two weeks, hoping to return to their villages near Pristina, capital of Kosova.

Serb snipers took pot shots at their convoy of open tractors and cars, killing a 12-year-old boy and wounding his mother, the refugees said.

Near a military camp at Djakovica, Berisha said he watched a woman resist rape by Serbs only to be shot dead in front of her husband and children. ``I dared not leave my car to try to help,'' he said, still visibly distraught. ``What could I do?''

New details from recent arrivals dovetail with stories told repeatedly since late March when the first waves of refugees streamed out of Kosova. More than 300,000 have come through two Albanian border posts. At least another 200,000 went to Macedonia and Montenegro.

``The routine is that armed Serbs arrive and tell everyone to put their valuables and car keys on the kitchen table and to be gone within 30 minutes,'' said Maureen Capps of San Diego, a Catholic Relief Services aid worker, in Kosova since last fall.

Other foreign aid workers and Kosovar refugees offer similar accounts.

``It has been completely orchestrated since summer, with troops, police and the paramilitary,'' said Keith Ursel, an American U.N. World Food Program officer.

A common pattern, he said, was for Serbs to frighten refugees away from their villages with shelling, then call in trucks by radio to empty out houses, which were then torched.

Expulsions reached a peak after the October offensive and then subsided. They resumed on a massive scale - backed by army tanks - after NATO planes attacked Serbia.

At first, Serbs targeted KLA strongholds populated by family members of ethnic Albanian fighters in the hills. Then they fanned out, emptying most towns and villages and burning many of them.

Those who resisted were persuaded with cluster bombs, mortar shells and sniper fire, the refugees said. Suspected guerrillas were arrested or executed on the spot. Beatings, sometimes fatal, were common. Theft by Serb police was systematic.

Reports of rape are growing, foreign medical workers said, although shame makes victims reluctant to speak. People are killed with no evident pattern, and farm animals, dogs and cats are put to death as a matter of course.

Often Serbs drive into villages in buses or police vehicles not easily identifiable by NATO pilots.

By now, according to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, fewer than a million ethnic Albanians are left in Kosova, and nearly half of them are displaced, hiding in forests and mountains.

No one knows how many displaced people remain in Kosova, but 400,000 seems a reasonable estimate, said UNHCR spokesman Jacques Franquin.

``I regret to say it, but any refugee who can't make it out on his own has no access to international aid,'' Franquin said. Air drops are not practical given the terrain and the complete control by Serb authorities, he said.

Meantime, ragtag KLA units fight in the mountains, partly reinforced by volunteers from the Albanian diaspora in Europe and beyond, but their weaponry and training are limited.

KLA military police in red berets patrol the streets of Kukes, sometimes rounding up young refugees as forced recruits.

Officials of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe monitor the border area, peering into Kosova from vantage points, but say they get scant intelligence.

Serb units repeatedly shell the sparsely inhabited border area near Tropoje farther north. On Tuesday, they stormed into Albania, briefly seizing control of a mountain village before going back.

The effects of a brutal and organized expulsion campaign hang over refugees, who have little idea what to do with their lives. Each day, the pool of despair deepens.

About 5,000 refugees live in a camp of 600 khaki canvas tents and 120 portable toilets put up by Italian civilian teams around a fetid pond. Italian fire trucks supply water. French and Italian doctors provide medical help.

Many uncounted thousands more, however, huddle under plastic sheets lashed to their tractors in fields and vacant lots. A powerful stench testifies to the lack of sanitation, and food deliveries are spotty.

Drita Canaj wept quietly under her scrap of cloth, worrying aloud about how she would feed her four young sons. Alternately, she prayed for four older sons in the mountains with the KLA.

Her husband, Haxhi, brooded about how to make a living as a farmer with no land, no tools and nothing but the ragged clothes on his back.

Still, some refugees tried to be hopeful.

Valmer Zeka, 18, was just accepted to study civil engineering at the University of Pristina in September. If NATO gets serious about thwarting the Serbs, he said, he might still make it.

Zeka and his family confirmed reports that Serb MiGs have dropped cluster bombs that explode chest-high, spraying sharp metal fragments in all directions.

``We are happy NATO is trying to help,'' Zeka said, ``but I don't understand their strategy. They are up in the air, but the Serbs are killing us on the ground.''

Unconditional return of refugees

The reports of the air strikes came as EU leaders and United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan met to try to find a solution to the three-week conflict.

Germany put forward a peace plan focusing on using the UN as a mediator.

It proposed that Nato should call a 24-hour ceasefire if Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic began to pull forces out of the province.

Nato said Germany's plan was "useful" but had no official status.

German proposals for a possible 24-hour pause in the bombing campaign to allow Serbian forces to begin a withdrawal have been greeted cautiously by Nato.

German Chancellor Gerhard Schroder said that air strikes would then be permanently called off when it was clear that all Serb troops had been pulled out of the province.

EU leaders did not discuss the plan. However, they did endorse a UN peace initiative announced last Friday calling on Yugoslavia to withdraw its troops, allow the unconditional return of all refugees and accept an international military force.

But UK Prime Minister Tony Blair stressed ethnic cleansing had to be defeated, and seen to be defeated, before Nato action could cease.

NATO prepares for 'end game' in Yugoslav campaign

April 14, 1999 Web posted at: 12:07 p.m. EDT (1607 GMT)

BRUSSELS, Belgium (CNN) -- NATO officials said Wednesday they were marshaling their forces for "the end game" in their military campaign against Yugoslavia.

Meanwhile, European leaders and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan held a summit to discuss diplomatic strategies to resolve the conflict over the southern Serbian province of Kosova.

"We will have more or less 1,000 aircraft on stream very soon -- able to maintain a continuous operation to tighten the screw on Serb forces," NATO spokesman Jamie Shea said.

Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic "is becoming weaker as NATO is becoming stronger," Shea said. "It is no longer a question of if we will win, but simply when."

Shea welcomed a German peace plan as "useful" but reiterated that Yugoslavia must adhere to the alliance's five key demands, including the withdrawal of troops from Kosova.

"It's not an official position yet of any government or NATO yet," Shea said of the German initiative. "It's a very useful and necessary effort to begin reflection on how we are going to handle the diplomacy of the end game."

Bonn's six-point initiative, which builds on a peace plan proposed by Annan, calls for a 24-hour halt to NATO airstrikes to give Yugoslavia a chance to start withdrawing its forces from Kosova.

The United States reacted cautiously to the German proposal. While House spokesman Joe Lockhart said the plan was largely consistent with NATO principles for ending the airstrikes. But he reiterated that the United States was "looking for agreement on all points" before it would consider halting the air campaign. 

Annan possible mediator

Both NATO and Russia, which has sharply criticized the bombings, have indicated they view Annan as a possible mediator. Belgrade described Annan's efforts as the "last chance" to peacefully settle the NATO-Yugoslavia standoff.

British Defense Secretary George Robertson told CNN that EU partners, most of whom also belong to NATO, planned to show they were still firmly committed to the NATO action.

"What will come out of today's summit will be the united resolve of European countries and all the NATO countries that (Yugoslav President Slobodan) Milosevic is going to be defeated," Robertson said.

The decision by Britain and the United States in recent days to commit more heavy weaponry and troops to the Balkans underlined "the rock solid unity of NATO," he said.

Shea said NATO's latest raids struck two more bridges and more military targets, including control facilities, fuel installations and lines of communications.

While Wednesday's raids were relatively light because of poor weather, Shea said, "We are neutralizing the weather factor" so that the bombings can continue "in thickest clouds and heaviest rain."

NATO also planned to launch Operation Allied Harbor on Wednesday, which aims to use NATO troops to help stabilize the refugee situation in Albania. An estimated 300,000 ethnic Albanians from Kosova have poured into Albania during the past three weeks.

Milosevic says unarmed presence acceptable

Milosevic said Wednesday that Yugoslavia was ready to accept international peacekeepers in Kosova after a political solution was found, but said they would have to be unarmed and none could come from NATO countries.

He called the NATO campaign "a conspiracy of lies" and said the only way to end the conflict was through negotiations.

NATO officials say that Yugoslavia must agree to an armed NATO peacekeeping force before it will halt the bombing campaign.

Milosevic spoke during a Belgrade news conference after he met with visiting Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko for several hours.

The meeting was an apparent step toward cementing Milosevic's wish to join an alliance with fellow Orthodox Slav nation Belarus and its much larger neighbor Russia.

Serbs report food rationing

Serbian television on Wednesday reported NATO attacks on the Bistrica hydroelectric plant near the southern Serb town of Nova Varos, about 200 kilometers (125 miles) south of Belgrade. A nearby bridge on a main railroad line that runs from Belgrade to the Montenegrin port of Bar was lightly damaged, the report said.

Serbian TV said the largest factory in the town of Valjevo, about 112 kilometers (70 miles) southwest of Belgrade, was hit and at least two people were hurt. Four explosions were reported in the central Serb town of Pozega.

Serb authorities said the hard-hit south was preparing for the first food rationing since the airstrikes began on March 24.

Britain: Arkan invading Kosova

British officials said Wednesday that Arkan, one of Serbia's most notorious paramilitary leaders, was scouting prisons for volunteers to join his unit in Kosova.

"This brutal thug is releasing hardened criminals from Serb jails to terrorize the people of Kosova," Robertson said.

Robertson said Arkan, whose real name is Zeljko Raznjotovic, was wanted by the International War Crimes Tribunal for the alleged massacre of 250 men taken from the hospital of the Croatian town of Vukovar in 1991. Full details of the indictment had been secret.

Robertson also said Gen. Ratko Mladic, an indicted war criminal and former commander of the Bosnian Serb army during the war in Bosnia, was now commanding a "gang of paramilitaries" in Kosova.

More rapes reported

Increasing reports of systematic, mass rapes are coming out of Djakovica in southwestern Kosova, said Clare Short, Britain's secretary of state for international development.

"Sometimes the rapes are performed in front of children, fathers and brothers," she said.

More than 800,000 ethnic Albanians are now believed displaced within Kosova, Short said.

"The situation is grim," she added. "I fear it will get worse. There is no humanitarian solution without military success. We cannot bring relief without reversing Serb aggression and this can only be done with the military."

Volunteers Ready To Join the Battle - Some Portraits of the Fighters

By Isuf Hajrizi
YONKERS, N.Y. - At a time when her friends at Christopher Columbus High School in the Bronx were deciding what to wear for the upcoming prom, 16-year-old Elinda Muriqi wore a different kind of garb on Monday. It was a camouflaged military uniform bearing a UCK insignia, the acronym of the Kosova Liberation Army, which is fighting for the freedom of Kosova from the Serbs. She wore the uniform as she prepared to leave New York to join the KLA in Kosova. "I want to enjoy life the way my friends in this country do, but I just can't take it anymore," she says as she adjusted her KLA cap while she made last-minute preparations before she and scores of her volunteer friends boarded buses for a New York airport. It was the first round of volunteers leaving for Kosova and more are expected to go soon, sources said. The recruits' morale and dedication were high. "Why should I look forward to living when my sisters are being raped and when children are dying in their mothers' arms of starvation?" Muriqi said. Her school friends "cried and cried," she said, and begged her not to go. But there was no persuading the young woman whose father, Ramiz, has been with the KLA since early last year. Her brother Elvir has made a name for himself in the U.S. as a boxer. "I'll die happy if the first bullet kills me -- I will die for the freedom of Kosova," she said with conviction. Muriqi and hundreds of Albanian-Americans like her have signed up as volunteers to fight the Serbs at a time when NATO insists ground troops are not an option. They and thousands of others reported to be traveling from Europe to fight are expected to undergo training in Albania before they join those in the front lines in Kosova. Although Belgrade insists that the KLA has been defeated, the fighters say their ranks are swelling with Albanian volunteers from all over the world. At the same time, NATO and the Pentagon have reported that the Yugoslav army is having a difficult time recruiting soldiers. On Sunday the Albanian-American volunteers said farewell to a crowd of several hundred family members and friends. There were tears, hugs and long stares into each other's eyes, as many feared they would not see each other again. As the volunteers stood in the parking lot of the Royal Regency Hotel wearing their KLA uniforms, the speakers praised them for their bravery and their dedication to liberate Kosova and bring freedom and normalcy to a people that has seen some of the most horrifying scenes since World War II. On Monday evening, while families stood outside in a somber mood, many with tears in their eyes, a retired general inside called their names over the microphone at the hotel's first floor, and one by one they lined up in formations of six with group commanders standing in front of them. They came from different walks of life, different backgrounds, different regions but with one common goal -- to come to the aid of their brothers and sisters in Kosova who have been mercilessly uprooted from villages where they have lived for centuries. There was Bejtullah Mehmeti and his 24-year-old son, Faik. Mehmeti is leaving 11 children, ages three weeks old through 28, in Pennsylvania. He believes that it is not so important if he and his son come back alive or dead as long as Kosova gets its freedom. In addition to a large family, father and son are leaving their business behind as well -- a pizza restaurant and an automobile firm, Kosova Auto Sales. Asked whether he is worried about his son's joining the war, he replied with pride: "I am happy that my son wants to go and die for his country." While Faik is a U.S.-born, his father came to the country of his dreams 28 years ago from Llaushe, a village in the Drenice region that has seen some of the worst atrocities by Serbs against the Albanian population. "Somebody has to do it, why not me?" says Faik. "If we are not going to do it, who will?" He adds a philosophical thought: "You can die as a result of street violence here in the U.S. just as easily; you might as well die for a cause." Other stories are similar. Ibrahim Krasniqi says, "I am going with my head high as if I am going at a wedding -- if I die, I'll be a martyr," he says as his cousin Xhevdet fusses with his uniform. Not all the volunteers are from Kosova. Ejup Beqiri, Nijazi Duani, Fatmir Abdullahu are from Diber, a region in Macedonia, while their friends, Kemal Bislimi is from Shkup and Ruzhdi Kajoshaj from Dinosh. Njazi and Fatmir are each leaving behind three children. While Shefki Caka is dedicated to fighting Serbs to the end, he has a message for the United Nations: "If you want to hurt Milosevic, you must recognize Kosova's independence." He is leaving two young children, his wife and his mother in Long Island. Twenty-something cousins Mehmet, Ylli and Agron Bytyci, come from Chicago and at least one of them, Ylli, is a chef and, if nothing else he promises his colleagues they will not die hungry. Enver Bojku is leaving his one-and-a-half-year-old child and his business in downtown Manhattan in the care of his brothers because he wants to see his village of Isniq near the Albanian border full of Albanians again. Isniq, like hundreds of other Albanian villages, has been subject to ethnic cleansing -- most people are believed to have been forced into Albania. His message to those who have second thoughts about going to fight for Kosova, Bojku's message is futuristic: "History will judge you." Adem Krasniqi, a 26-year-old construction worker, knows a thing or two about the army and fighting. In the early 1990s, he was part of the Yugoslav army when he was ordered to shell Croatian villages. He later deserted and joined his brother in the Bronx, and now he is returning to the same region as a commander of his team to fight against an army he once was a part of. Agim Selmanaj of Decan is not sure what awaits him on the ground, but at least he has chosen his warname for himself. "My friends decided I should be called 'Madman,'" he says jokingly. The idea came from a photo of him in a newspaper and the way he was looking at the camera. His friend Avni Tetaj who comes from the same region and works in construction smiles in agreement. Brahim Ukaj comes from the village of Vranoc -- he was only 17 when Milosevic tried to recruit him in "his murderous army," he says. He is not sure where his relatives are now. The last time he heard from them they were in Prishtine, Kosova's capital. "I am happy I am getting the chance to go and fight those who are terrorizing our people," he adds. His brothers Shiqer and Isa Gashi, although not of fighting age, echo similar words. From Vuthaj, Montenegro, Ymer Kuka has been a teacher for 20 years in Prizren, another Kosova town that has been subject to ethnic cleansing in the last two weeks. When he came to the U.S. nine years ago, he was worried that he and many of his fellow Albanians would never see their homeland again -- they would lose. "Now that I see all these young people returning, I realize we have not lost," he says. At 57, he is leaving behind two grown boys ages 21 and 24. He said he had a difficult time separating from his younger son who insisted he wanted to join him, and, live or die, they would at least be together. As he fights his tears back, he shows a reporter pictures of his family, including his one-year-old granddaughter. He says one of the happiest moment in his life was the night of March 24 when NATO launched its ongoing air attack against Serbian targets and his second happiest day was Monday when he left for Kosova. Taxi driver Kadrush Bajra, 50, is not new to the KLA. This is the second time he is joining the fighters after being in Kosova during the Serb offensive during last summer. He had volunteered to be in Junik, a village near the Albanian border that saw some of the heaviest shelling during a Serb sweep. This father of two is not new to the Serb prisons either. In 1981 he was jailed and sentenced to to two years in prison for his political activities when he was in the U.S. While most volunteers had death in mind as they boarded buses and headed to the airport, Uk Lushi puts it all in perspective: "One spends all his life studying death; this is a fight against death."

Isuf Hajrizi is managing editor of Illyria, a twice weekly Albanian-American newspaper in New York.

Song honors captured U.S. soldiers; proceeds to benefit refugee relief

MONTEBELLO, California (CNN) -- Inspired by a recent report on the Kosovo crisis he saw on TV, musician-composer Steve Gooden gathered a guitar he purchased for a friend -- and 15 minutes later came up with a song dedicated to the three American soldiers being held captive in Yugoslavia.
Gooden on Wednesday performed "Let Them Be Free" at Schurr High School. Among those in the crowd of several hundred was Vivian Ramirez, the mother of captured U.S. Staff Sgt. Andrew Ramirez, 24. Ramirez graduated from Schurr High School in 1992.
The acoustical chorus by Gooden is his personal tribute to the three U.S. soldiers in Yugoslav custody. All proceeds from sales of the single will go to the American Red Cross, earmarked for refugee relief efforts in the Balkans.
Ramirez's mother speaks
An emotional Vivian Ramirez spoke briefly to the crowd, thanking them for their many prayers, and saying that while as a mother she continues to worry over the safety of her son, she is very proud of him.
"When he wrote to me, talked to me on the phone, told me he was going to Macedonia for a peace mission, he was excited, he wanted to go, he wanted to do something for those people, he wanted to help. I was very proud of him -- of course as a mother, I worried as all mothers do," she said.
"Thank you for all your prayers, I'm sure that he's hearing them, and he will be back, real soon," she said to loud applause.
Prior to composing the song, Gooden said he never played the guitar -- and that he just happened to have one with him that he bought as a gift for a friend.
Copies of "Let Them Be Free" can be purchased on Gooden's recording company, 2KMusic Productions, Web site at www.2k2good.com.
The three U.S. soldiers -- Ramirez; Staff Sgt. Christopher J. Stone, 25; and Spec. Steven M. Gonzales, 22 -- were taken into custody while on a routine border patrol near the Yugoslav-Macedonia border. Yugoslav officials have said they are being treated well.