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KOSOVSKA MITROVICA, Serbia - Up to 1,000 Kosovo Serbs held a rally on Friday night to protest against their plight in the divided city of Mitrovica and across the province.
The protesters gathered in Mitrovica a few hundred metres away from the bridge over Ibar river, which has become a symbol of division between ethnic Albanians and Serbs in Kosovo.
Several speakers at the rally protested against violence against Serbs by ethnic Albanians, seeking revenge for the campaign by Serb forces earlier this year which drove hundreds of thousands of Albanians from their homes.
"We ask the international community to bring back the Serbs who left Kosovo like they helped Albanian refugees," one man told the crowd in the northern city.
Serbs have grouped together in one area of Mitrovica, north of the bridge. Albanians say the Serbs have acted illegally, taking over many Albanian homes.
Albanians have held several protests over the past few days, clashing repeatedly with French peacekeeping soldiers who have prevented them crossing into the Serb area.
Demonstrators at the Serb rally carried banners with slogans such as "Stop the violence against Serbs" and "We ask for peace".
The red, blue and white Serbian and Yugoslav flags fluttered on top of cars and in front of a building where the speeches were made.
The protesters heard slogans both for and against Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic.
"Milosevic prolonged communism in Serbia. He sold Serbs in Bosnia and he sold us here. As far as we are concerned he can go back to history. What is he offering us today?" one speaker said.
On the other side of the Ibar, some ethnic Albanians gathered and quietly watched the Serbs who came towards the bridge, stopped some 50 metres away and chanted "Serbia".
"The protest was quiet. It is still legal. Legality stops when the stones start to fly," said Captain Bertrand Bonneau, a French press officer.
Officials from the United Nations and the international peacekeeping force in Kosovo say they are working hard on ways to reduce tension in Mitrovica and hope to reach an accord guaranteeing free movement within the city.