[ALBSA-Info] NATO acts on Albanian extremists ????

[Iris Pilika]

NATO acts on Albanian extremists

French peacekeepers in action in the flashpoint town of Mitrovica
February 1, 2001
Web posted at: 1453 GMT


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.


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.


Ethnic Albanian protestors clash with KFOR troops
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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