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PRISTINA - Serb authorities Thursday condemned an attack on 155 Serbs fleeing Kosovo and NATO was red-faced about its failure to prevent violence against the convoy which was under its protection.
General Klaus Reinhardt, the German commander of the NATO-led KFOR peacekeeping troops in Kosovo, called the attack on the refugee convoy in the western town of Pec ``stupid'' and vowed to catch those responsible and improve convoy security.
At least 18 Serbs were slightly injured in Wednesday's huge melee in the middle of Pec that lasted from afternoon until late in the evening. Nineteen vehicles were burned, including one belonging to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) which organized the movement of the refugees.
The incident played into the hands of Serbs who maintain the NATO-led KFOR peacekeeping force in Kosovo is not up to the task of protecting them from reprisals by Kosovo's ethnic Albanian majority.
Serbs Say Kfor Not Able To Protect Them
Ivica Dacic, spokesman for Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's ruling Socialist Party, said the U.N. mission in Kosovo ``is not only a tacit observer of genocide against a non-Albanian population but also an accomplice in the crime.
``If the U.N. military and civilian authorities are not able to provide security for all citizens then they should publicly admit this. It is clear to everyone in the world that the problem in Kosovo...has always been ethnic Albanian terrorism and separatism,'' Dacic said in Belgrade.
Ironically, the Serbs were leaving Kosovo to escape from a Serb enclave in the western town of Orahovac where they have been under a virtual state of siege from ethnic Albanians for months.
``To attack refugees on their way out is not only stupid, it's a very inhuman approach,'' Reinhardt told reporters in Pristina.
``In the future we'll control those refugee convoys even more and I will not tolerate any kinds of violence like this. We'll look for the guys responsible and try to get them,'' he added.
Kouchner, Solana Condemn Attack
Bernard Kouchner, the top U.N. official in Kosovo, said he thought the attack was spontaneous but this did not make it any less reprehensible.
``People were confused because they believe that Serbs were coming back...but this is unacceptable and we have to reinforce the security of these convoys,'' he said.
The new European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana, on his first visit to Kosovo since retiring as NATO secretary general, said the attack undermined efforts to maintain minority groups in Kosovo.
``I condemn these acts which are not going in the direction of a secure environment and a multi-ethnic pattern,'' he said.
Following the Pec incident, and a Serb blockade of a main road in northern Kosovo to protest at four alleged kidnappings, KFOR said it could not accept disruptions of road traffic.
``We will not tolerate any roadblocks or obstacles in our areas of operation,'' KFOR spokesman Major Ole Irgens said.
The NATO-protected convoy of Serbs was attacked by a crowd of about 1,500 ethnic Albanians, many of them in Pec for a market day, as the vehicles halted at a main intersection near a police building to ask directions.
``For some reason or other the convoy became separated and for some reason they then stopped to ask for directions to the road,'' Irgens said. ``We don't know why it was split.''
An investigation was underway but KFOR officials said there appeared to have been two key factors: first, part of the convoy became detached after a Serb civilian vehicle broke down, and then lagging vehicles stopping a second time to ask directions.