Shelling Along Kosovo Border Kills 2

Fighting between the Macedonian army and ethnic Albanian insurgents spilled over into neighboring Kosovo, killing two people and adding to international pressure for negotiations to end the violence.

It was the most serious case of the violence in Macedonia spreading into Kosovo since government forces began battling ethnic Albanian insurgents more than six weeks ago.

Planning a trip Friday to Skopje, the Macedonian capital, Hans Haekkerup, the U.N. administrator of Kosovo, said he would be "raising the urgent need for restraint by the Macedonian forces and for dialogue to replace the shooting."

One of those killed in the shelling of Krivenik, a Kosovo village just 1,200 yards from the Macedonian border, was Associated Press Television News producer Kerem Lawton, a 30-year-old British national based in Pristina, the capital of the Serb province.

He died of shrapnel wounds he suffered when a mortar round hit his vehicle as he arrived in the village on Thursday morning. The United Nations said 20 were left wounded by the shelling.

Both the Macedonian army and the rebels denied responsibility for the mortar attack. Members of the NATO-led peacekeeping force in Kosovo examined the craters left by the shells in an effort to determine who fired them.

In Washington, Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. Craig Quigley said it was "not all clear where the mortar rounds came from. We'll try to find out."

The attack came as the peacekeepers stepped up their patrols along the border with Kosovo, near the area where Macedonian troops were skirmishing with the rebels in the rugged mountains. Reporters near the border said the sounds of fighting eased by mid-afternoon.

The army said it was continuing its offensive. Col. Blagoja Markovski, the army spokesman said troops met no resistance in efforts to "clear out terrorists" from the northern border with Kosovo. He said the rebels no longer controlled inhabited villages in the region.

About 20 insurgents who opened fire on an army patrol near Jazince, on the border were "pushed back into Kosovo" overnight, he said.

In Pristina, the Kosovo capital, the three main political parties on Friday blamed the Macedonian government for the deadly shelling and warned it could lead to a destabilization of the entire region.

A British-led task force of about 400 troops deployed in the border area Thursday with tanks, artillery and mortars to support patrols of the frontier in the section of Kosovo under American control in the east. It was to start operations later in the week.

"What we're trying to do is stop the spread of extremism," said Maj. Fergus Smith, a British spokesman. "If (the rebels) come through, then our role will be to interdict them."

Despite a mix of Slavs and ethnic Albanians, Macedonia long escaped the violence that gripped Kosovo, where thousands died in a Serb crackdown on ethnic Albanians tht ended in mid-1999 after a sustained NATO bombing of Yugoslavia.

But the six-week Macedonian insurrection has shaken the government and made clear that more must be done to placate the ethnic Albanian minority. The rebels say they are fighting for greater rights and recognition for ethnic Albanians and an end to what they insist is second-class citizen status.

In Vienna, Macedonian Foreign Minister Srdjan Kerim told the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe on Thursday that improving the status of his country's ethnic Albanians was a key government concern.

"Macedonia will continue to play a constructive role" in achieving stability across Europe, he said.

Meanwhile, Defense Ministry spokesman Gjorgji Trendafilov claimed the push by government troops was successful.

"We are driving the rebels out. They are running from Macedonia," he said, adding: "We are advancing toward the northern border" with Kosovo.

The Macedonian government characterized the latest clashes as a mop-up effort to drive the insurgents out of the country ahead of talks with leaders of the former Yugoslav republic's ethnic Albanian minority, who are outnumbered by Slavs by more than three to one in the tiny nation of 2 million people.

But it has refused to negotiate directly with the rebels, whom it considers terrorists fighting to split up Macedonia, a former Yugoslav republic.

In contrast to government claims of victory, the rebels suggest they have merely pulled back and regrouped in the rugged and largely inaccessible hills near Tetovo, Macedonia's second-largest city and the focus of fierce fighting over the past two weeks.

The rebels threatened to counter the latest government offensive, which began Wednesday.

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