[ALBSA-Info] Britain mulls rethink on Serbia-Kosovo buffer zone

[Gazhebo at aol.com]

Britain mulls rethink on Serbia-Kosovo buffer zone

By Mike Collett-White
  
LONDON, Feb 21 (Reuters) - Britain said on Wednesday the West should revise 
its policy on a five-km (three-mile) buffer zone along the boundary between 
Serbia and Kosovo, which it says has become a training ground for Kosovo 
Albanian guerrillas. 

Yugoslav forces are banned from the area imposed on Belgrade at the end of 
NATO's 1999 bombing campaign to separate Serbian troops from NATO 
peacekeepers and reassure Kosovo Albanians returning to villages they fled 
during Serbian repression. 

But ethnic Albanian guerrillas are said to be active in the zone, and have 
been blamed for violent attacks on Serb targets in and around it. 

"We are continuing to be concerned about the situation on the ground in the 
safety zone," said a British defence ministry official. "People not living 
there traditionally have been setting up training among other things. 

"We need to work towards a medium-term solution. If we leave it there is a 
tendency for these people to get more entrenched and the tension level to 
rise." 

He said the British military was not ruling out options which include 
NATO-led peacekeepers working alongside Serbian forces within the zone and 
scrapping it altogether, although no decision had been made. 

"If they (the Serbian forces) reform, change structure over time, we are not 
ruling out any options at this time," the official said. 

When asked whether Britain would back closing the buffer zone altogether, he 
added: 

"I don't think we should shut our mind to it." 

Serbian patience is wearing thin over what it says are attacks by "Albanian 
extremists" threatening stability in the entire Balkans region. 

The latest criticism came in response to a bomb attack last week in northern 
Kosovo which killed seven Serbs and injured dozens more. Two days later a 
landmine blast killed three Serb policemen. 

The British official said the buffer zone may be part of the problem. 

"If you create a zone without security, people tend to move into it. We are 
talking to Kosovo Albanians and asking them to be sensible and to show some 
restraint." 

Proposals from Belgrade include narrowing the buffer zone in Serbia and 
extending it across the boundary into Kosovo as well as having joint patrols 
there between international peacekeepers and Serbian forces. 

Britain said it was "encouraged" by the constructive response from Belgrade 
to the tensions.