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PRISTINA, Yugoslavia -- The top U.N. official in Kosovo on Saturday condemned a bomb attack that killed a Serb as "a racist, fascist, stupid act of cowardliness" and called on civilians to help international police find the perpetrators.
KLA commander Agim Ceku, the military commander of the rebel Kosovo Liberation Army echoed Bernard Kouchner's condemnation, saying the KLA "very strongly condemns the act committed last night." Serbs say the KLA is behind the violence against them, something KLA leaders deny.
"We will not accept the return of blind terrorism against innocent people," Kouchner told journalists, in comments that indicated he viewed the killing as part of a series of revenge attacks on Serbs by ethnic Albanians. He said he had requested the United Nations send additional investigators to the province to help crack the crime.
British peacekeepers said a 23-year-old Serb man was killed in the first of two late-night explosions that shook central Pristina late Friday. Five ethnic Albanians, including three children, were slightly injured by the blast, about an hour before midnight Friday on the third floor of a five-story apartment building.
The second explosion, about 30 minutes later, rocked a neighboring building but caused no casualties.
Tensions between Serbs and ethnic Albanians remain high after the deaths of an estimated 10,000 civilians in an 18-month crackdown launched by Milosevic to crush the rebel Kosovo Liberation Army.
The crackdown ended after a 78-day NATO bombing campaign that led to a peace agreement, the departure of Yugoslav forces, and the arrival of the NATO-led peacekeeping force.
While the crime rate has dropped in the capital, Pristina, acts of violence continue to plague the province. Kouchner called on Kosovo civilians to "break the law of silence" by coming forward with information about what happened Friday.
Since June 12, NATO-led peacekeepers have been working to stabilize the situation in Kosovo, but have come under criticism from Serbs for favoring the province's Albanian majority.