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WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Clinton administration boosted the self-determination hopes of ethnic Albanians in the Serbian province of Kosovo on Tuesday with announcements of a request to Congress for aid and establishment of a diplomatic office in Pristina, the provincial capital.
A three-day, U.S.-financed conference of ethnic Albanians was concluded in suburban Leesburg, Va., with a ceremonial gathering in the department's ornate Benjamin Franklin room.
``There is no better feeling than to see the people of Kosovo at peace, hard at work and planning for the future of what will always be your rightful home,'' said Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who presided at the gathering.
Albright and other State Department officials made no direct reference to independence for the Albanians, whose suppression by Yugoslavia's Serb-led forces brought about a NATO air war that drove out the Serbs. Serbia is Yugoslavia's dominant republic.
James Dobbins, who oversees department policy in Kosovo, said hardly any ethnic Albanians do not want the province to separate from Yugoslavia. He said the Clinton administration supports the idea that the ``will of the people'' should be expressed in a referendum.
Serbs were not invited to the conference, held by the U.S. Institute of Peace, a research group financed by the U.S. government.
In a declaration, the ethnic Albanians, including members of the militant Kosovo Liberation Army, set as a goal ``self-determination based on a referendum conducted under international auspices.''
The declaration also recommended transformation of the KLA, disarmed under a Kosovo peace accord, into ``a national defense force'' for Kosovo. It also said the province is entering a ``transitional period,'' although the declaration did not say specifically that the aim is secession and independence.
Telling the Albanians she was their friend, Albright urged them to not to succumb to the temptations of revenge, corruption and crime. She said: ``You must do everything to you can to prevent the killing, terrorizing and expulsion of Serbs and other minorities.''