World

Report: 15 Die In Kosovo Battles

By CBSNews.com staff CBSNews.com staff

January 15, 1999 / 10:35 AM EST / CBS

Serb forces clashed with ethnic Albanian rebels Friday in three villages in southern Kosovo, and Serb sources reported at least 15 guerrillas were killed. Elsewhere in the province, two international monitors were reportedly shot.

A Western source on the international peace verification team said fighting was raging close to the provincial capital, Pristina.

The Serb-run Media Center, which is close to authorities, said at least 15 Kosovo Liberation Army fighters were killed in the fighting. It said Serb police confiscated large quantities of arms and drove off the KLA rebels.

International verifiers were trying to talk to both sides in an effort to stop the fighting.

If confirmed, the death toll would be the second-highest reported in a single clash in the province since an informal cease-fire was agreed to in October. Thirty-six rebels were reported killed last month by Yugoslav army border guards who intercepted them as they were trying to smuggle in arms from neighboring Albania.

The latest violence dashed hopes that the release of eight Yugoslav soldiers captured last week by the KLA might ease tensions in Kosovo, a province of Yugoslavia's main republic Serbia. Ethnic Albanians make up about 90 percent of the separatist province's two million people.

In the first confrontation involving injuries to members of the Kosovo Verification Mission, two monitors were shot in the southwestern part of the province, said the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which runs the mission.

Their injuries were not life-threatening, OSCE spokesman Mons Nyberg said in Vienna.

The monitors have said both parties to the conflict appear to be preparing for war and that further conflict is likely unless a negotiated settlement can be reached.

Serb sources said police were searching for a "terrorist group" which killed a policeman and attacked a government patrol in the area five days ago. The same group was responsible for killing seven pro-government ethnic Albanians in southwestern Kosovo, the Serb Media Center said.

Serb officials frequently refer to KLA guerillas as terrorists.

In a sign of Belgrade's resolve to retain control of the province, ministers arrived Friday from the capital and held their first-ever Cabinet meeting in Kosovo.

The government, in a statement after the meeting, denounced terrorism as "an evil for all" and said "all perpetrators of terrorist acts must be punished for the crimes they committed."

The statement reiterated the government's commitment that Kosovo's problems be solved through political dialogue, and accused ethnic Albanian leaders of fomenting terrorism.

Yugoslav forces were put on high alert last week after the KLA captured eight soldiers near the northwest Kosovo town of Kosovska Mitrovica. The hostages were released Wednesday after rebels said they received assurances from U.S. and European mediatos that they would urge the government to free nine guerrillas captured last month.

In Sarajevo, Bosnia, the supreme NATO military commander, Gen. Wesley Clarke, expressed concern the violence was eroding the cease-fire brokered by the United States in October.

"The longer the use of force goes on inside Kosovo the more intractable the problem is likely to become," Clarke said.

In his weekly news conference, moderate ethnic Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova said preparations were under way for a meeting of all "political forces and institutions in Kosovo" to forge a common stand.

The OSCE is trying to organize a meeting of the ethnic Albanian factions in Vienna, Austria, to prepare for talks with the Belgrade government on the future of the province.

More than 1,000 people have been killed since Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic launched a crackdown last February to crush Kosovo's separatist militants. An estimated 300,000 people were driven from their homes. Of them, 180,000 remain displaced, according to international officials.