[ALBSA-Info] KFOR says armed men retreat from Macedonia village

[Gazhebo at aol.com]

KFOR says armed men retreat from Macedonia village

  
DEBELDE, Yugoslavia, March 5 (Reuters) - Armed men presumed to be Kosovo 
Albanians who have engaged Macedonian security forces around an ethnic 
Albanian-populated village in Macedonia were seen leaving on Monday, U.S. 
peacekeepers in Kosovo said. 

Jim Marshal, spokesman for the U.S.-led contingent of the KFOR peacekeeping 
force, said the men appeared to be dumping their uniforms and weapons before 
heading towards Kosovo. 

"We saw a lot of men in black uniforms crossing into Kosovo, entering 
buildings, changing out of their uniforms, leaving their weapons and coming 
here to Kosovo in civilian clothes," Marshal told reporters in the Kosovo 
village of Debelde, where U.S. troops are monitoring the flashpoint. "We 
suspect there are caches of weapons and uniforms inside Kosovo." 

Marshal said there were believed to be between 70 and 150 men in the group. 
It was not clear how many had withdrawn. "We have seen machine guns and some 
RPGs (rocket-propelled grenades) and light weapons," he said. 

"We will disarm them and detain them and investigate each base individually. 
It is up to KFOR to decide about further investigations. We are talking with 
the civilians here in Debelde to convince the armed men to hand over their 
weapons and finish this thing," Marshal said.