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September 30

  • Russia has expressed regret and concern about the clashes during a mass antigovernment demonstration in Belgrade on Wednesday night. 20 people were injured when demonstrators rioted in the streets, demanding the resignation of President Slobodan Milosevic. To break up the demonstrations the police used water-cannons. As the spokesman for the Russian Foreign Ministry Vladimir Rahmanin commented on the incident , he pointed out that the relationship of the Yugoslav authorities and the opposition were an internal affair of the Balkan country. At the same time the Russian diplomat came out for a settlement of political differences through constructive dialogue.

  • Belgrade says North Atlantic Alliance has inflicted 100 billion dollar damages on Yugoslavia. It feels free to demand that the Alliance make up, in full measure, for the damages. Yugoslav foreign minister Zhivadin Jovanovic said Wednesday in New York that the NATO bombing and missile raids had made civilians suffer, destroyed thousands of houses and at least 52 Orthodox monasteries.
     
  • A large-scale anti-government rally was held Wednesday evening in Belgrade. The demonstration demanded resignation of President Slobodan Milosevic. They hurled rocks at police forces and attempted to break a way to the presidential residence. Water cannons were used for the dispersal of the anti-government rally. Both anti-government demonstrators and police forces suffered casualties. Mass action for the resignation of Slobodan Milosevic has been reported in a number of Serbian cities since the 21st of this month. It was called by an opposition bloc of ten political parties that have no representation in the national legislature.

September 29

  • The UN Security Council has reiterated its support for the territorial integrity of Yugoslavia which accused it of supporting Kosovo's bid for independence. The 15 Security Council members met on Tuesday at Russia's request to discuss the transformation of the Kosovo Liberation Army into a civil protection force. Earlier Belgrade called on the Security Council to cancel the move, arguing that it legalized the ethnic Albanian separatists. In its message to the Council Yugoslavia pointed out that the KLA's disarmament had been carried out with violations of the UN resolution demanding a full demilitarization. There was no unanimity among the Council members while discussing the situation with the KIA, but all spoke out in favour of a single Yugoslavia.

  • Russian independent experts have begun working in Belgrade. They intend to assess the events around Yugoslavia from the point of view of International Law. The group headed by Stanislav Chernichenko arrived in Belgrade on Tuesday. Stanislav Chernichenko said it is necessary to check certain facts on the spot. That is important, he said, not only in order to punish those responsible, but also prevent such things from happening in the future. According to the facts collected, NATO bombing strikes were meant first of all to destroy the economy and make civilians suffer as much as possible. This was pointed out by one of the leaders of Yugoslavia's parliament Milisav Chutovic when meeting with the Russian experts.
     
  • Representatives of the international police in Kosovo detained four persons on Tuesday suspected of having committed the terrorist act at the market in Bresje near the city of Kosovo Polje. Two of them are Albanians. As a result of the terrorist act two persons were killed and 41 injured. Bresje is populated mainly by the Serbs. And all victims of the terrorist act were Serbian civilians. The act had sparked off a wave of condemnation all over the world.

September 28

  • Moscow is assessing negatively the latest statements that were made by the leader of the former Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) Hashim Thaqi, believing that they can't promote the settlement of the Kosovo problem. As the Russian foreign ministry spokesman pointed out in an interview for the RIA - Novosti news agency, as before, Russia finds it necessary that the resolution of the UN Security Council, which, among other things, provides for the disarmament of the Kosovo Liberation Army, be implemented. Some days ago Hashim Thaqi said in an interview for the Pristina "Koha Ditore" newspaper that the Kosovo protection corps that was created on the basis of the Kosovo Liberation Army would become an army in the future.

  • The government of the Union Republic of Yugoslavia has voiced a protest against the agreement to transform the Kosovo Liberation Army into the allegedly civil structure - the Kosovo Protection Corps. A letter of protest was circulated in the United Nations headquaters in New York by the Yugoslav charge d'affairs Vladislav Jovanovic on Monday. The letter says that the agreement with the Kosovo Liberation Army is the attempt to legalise that terrorist organisation and therefore it will not be recognised by the Yugoslav government Vladislav Jovanovic underscored that the disarmament of the Kosovo Liberation Army had been conducted with numerous violations of the UN Security Council resolution which stipulated a complete demilitarisation of that extremist organisation. The Army's militants were given three months to attack Serbs and gypses unpunished and to hide arms.
     
  • The United Nations Development programme has appointed the star of the Brazil football Ronaldo an ambassador of peace to Kosovo. He has headed the fight against poverty in that Serbia region. On Monday he visited the town of Dyakovitsa in the east of Kosovo where he was warmly greeted by the local population. He is reported to donate to one of the town's primary schools a substantial sum of money.

September 27

  • The NATO Secretary-General Javier Solana has called today on the leaders of the Albanian and Serbian communities to reconcile. Mr. Solana who is currently in Pristina has said that they should pledge their loyalty to the construction of a multi-national society in Kosovo. He added that Albanian and Serbian leaders must put an and to violence in the region. Earlier in an interview with Newsweek Javier Solana condemned terror against the Serbian population which was unleashed by the Albanian extremists. Since the NATO-led Force was introduced to Kosovo some 300 Serbs fell victim to terrorists.

  • In Kosovo Serbs have been coming under attack increasingly more often. According to the press centre of the international peacekeeping force, a Serbian woman died in hospital of the city Kosovo Pole yesterday. Her husband died a day earlier after he'd been wounded in the explosion of a grenade that was thrown in their house. A Serbian village, south of the city Kosovska Mitrovica, came under mortar fire on Saturday night. Meanwhile, an arms cache has been discovered in Kosovo Polje, a cache of the fighters of the so-called "Kosovo Liberation Army", which has recently been transformed into a "Kosovo Protection Corps". The deadline for the KLA to hand n in all of its weapons expired a week ago.
     
  • Yesterday NATO's Secretary-General Javier Solana arrived in Kosovo's administrative centre Pristina to meet representatives of the Serbian and Albanian communities to discuss the course of the peacekeeping process in the province. In an interview with the American Magazine "NEWSWEEK" of Saturday Solana denounced the campaign of terror by Albanian extremists against Kosovo Serbs. When asked about the future of the province, NATO's Secretary-General came out against Kosovo's separation from Yugoslavia.

September 26

  • One Serb is reported to have been killed and four wounded in Kosovo as a tractor they were driving ran into an ambush set by Albanian militants. The incident took place near Kosovska Kamenitsa, an area controlled by the American servicemen. The Serbian National Council based in the north of the province has said the Serbs will have to create their own protection force in response. On Monday the KFOR allowed the KLA to, in fact, legalise the separatist Kosovo Liberation Army.
     
  • Yugoslav General Nebojsa Pavkovic has spoken out for establishing a self-defence force by Serbs in Kosovo. He is in command of the third army, which was stationed in Kosovo before the NATO aggression. General Pavkovic believes that this would be rightful move since NATO not only failed to disarm the terrorist Kosovo Liberation Army but also transformed it into a Kosovo protection corps. The very next day after the establishment of the corps Albanian terrorists killed one Serbian farmer and injured four others. NATO admits that more than a hundred Sorbs have been killed and over 80 percent of Serbs have been expelled from the province since the international forces were deployed in Kosovo.

September 25

  • Yugoslavia demands that the United Nations Security Council abrogate the KFOR - Kosovo Liberation Army agreement under which the Liberation Army is to turn into a Kosovo Protection Force. A letter the Yugoslav government has sent to the United Nations says the agreement aims to legalize the hitherto banned terrorist grouping. What the Kosovo Liberation Army is to do under the agreement, is change its name. It may retain its chain of command and weapons. It will be run by the same people. It will, in fact, turn into a regular army of a sovereign Kosovo. Russia, too, has lashed out against the agreement. It feels the failure to disband the Kosovo Liberation Army may derail political efforts to settle the problems of Kosovo.

September 24

  • Spanish medico-legal experts did not confirm reports about mass murders of Albanians by the Serbs in northern Kosovo. They have examined 187 graves, found in different sites in the Spanish KFOR contingent control zone and found that the people buried there are militants of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army. There are no signs of torture on their bodies, and they were each buried in a separate grave according to Muslim rituals. The experts didn't find any mass graves in the examined region.

  • In order to ensure stable peace in Kosovo, the Albanians living in that Serbian province should give up the intention to attain independence from Yugoslavia. Such a statement was made by NATO's secretary general Javier Solana when meeting with newsmen in Washington on Thursday. In his opinion changing the borders in the south of Serbia, if the international community permits that could lead to similar processes in other Balkan countries, and could include also the territory of Russia.

September 23

  • Belgrade has reacted sharply to the agreement signed in Pristina on Monday, the 20th, on transforming the "Kosovo Liberation Army", KLA, into a "Kosovo Protection Corps", KPC. Serbia's rulling Socialists Party has described the agreement on KLA transformation as a farce and a proof that the Albanian extremists and "their patrons" seek to create an ethnically pure Kosovo. According to the Serbian Renewal Movement under the Vuk Draskovic, the basic danger of the agreement on the setting up of the "Protection Corps" is that the international community in the face of the United Nations has actually recognized a terrorist organisation.
     
  • The bodies of two Serbs, father and son, allegedly killed by Albanian extremists, were found near Gnilane town in eastern Kosovo on Thursday. Another Serb suffered serious wounds when someone threw a hand grenade into his house at Lipljan village. The KFOR press service also said earlier today that a Turkish soldier was killed and another one injured in an explosion which occurred near their base inside the German responsibility zone. The statement gave no further details of the incident. Five more German peacekeepers suffered various wounds stepping on a mine after straying into a mineland during a patrol mission.

  • Momchilo Traikovic of the Serb Resistance Movement and Serb Bishop Artemiy have withdrawn from the Provisional Council of Kosovo which is the consultative body of the United Nations mission in that troubled province of Serbia. Traikovic and Artemiy alike are protesting against moves to turn the Kosovo Liberation Army into a Kosovo protection corps. Both feel the protection corps was formed behind the Serbs' back and is a purely Albanian setup, which will hardly contribute to the efforts to build a multi-ethnic Kosovo.

September 22

  • Moscow views the agreement to create a Kosovo protection corps as an attempt to legalize part of the military units of Kosovo militants. A statement made earlier in the day by the Russian Foreign Ministry points out the importance of resolving as soon as possible the problem of disarmament of the Kosovo Liberation Army. The disarmament, the statement says, must be complete.

  • The agreement on turning the Kosovo Liberation Army into a force for protecting Kosovo signed on Monday has no legal force. This is said in a statement made by Yugoslavia's Justice Ministry, which was circulated in Belgrade on Tuesday evening. The agreement is a violation of the resolution of the UN Security Council and threatens the territorial intergity of Yugoslavia, says the statement. Therefore, Yugoslavia will use all means to oppose the implementation of the agreement.

September 21

  • This country has severely criticized the latest agreement between the Kosovo Force and the Kosovo Liberation Army that reshapes the KLA into a Kosovo Protection Corps. A senior Russian diplomat said in Moscow that the agreement preserves the KLA's command structure and arsenal and allows the separatist force to function on under a slightly different name. FRANCE PRESS says ethnic Albanian death squads in Kosovo continue their campaign of killings and expulsions of local Serbs. Of the once thriving Serb population of about 200 thousand, 180 thousand have fled Kosovo in the three and a half months since NATO waded in.
     
  • Russia wants action to be taken in Kosovo firmly and strictly in compliance with the relevant United Nations Security Council resolution. This came in a statement in New York yesterday by the Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov, who leads this country's delegation to the 54th UN General Assembly session. Ivanov pointed out that the resolution provided for a complete demilitarization of the "Kosovo Liberation Army" and for preserving Yugoslavia's sovereignty and territorial integrity. Any attempt to misinterpret these provisions, the Russian Foreign Minister stressed, would undermine The United Nations authority and make more involved a settlement in the Balkans.
     
  • An agreement was signed in Pristina yesterday night to demilitarize the "Kosovo Liberation Army" and turn it into a "Kosovo Protection Corps" to be led by an Albanian field commander Agim Cheku. The spokesman for the UN Secretary- General in Kosovo Bernard Couchner has told a news conference in Pristina that the Protection Corps will be a "purely civilian organisation". Yet, the Corps members will be allowed to carry weapons "for self-defence and to perform what tasks they may be assigned". The signing of the agreement was timed with a statement by the Kosovo Albanian leader Hashim Thaqi about his plan to set up a political party that would secure Kosovo's separation from Yugoslavia.

September 20

  • The command of the multinational peacekeeping force in Kosovo, KFOR, has extended for 48 hours a deadline for the extremist separatist organization Kosovo Liberation Army to hand over weapons. The deadline expired on September 19. A KFOR spokesman Vladimir UIasevich of Russia says Albanian militants still keep large amounts of arms they were supposed to turn in. He came out against a KLA demand to allow its transformation into a civil defense corps as the basis for the future armed forces of an independent Kosovo.

  • In Kosovo the international force command has extended the deadline, by which the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army should disarm itself, by another 48 hours. According to the commander of the international force in Kosovo, KFOR, British General Michael Jackson, the decision was taken because no compromise was reached at the Pristina-held talks between KFOR and the Kosovo Liberation Army about transforming this paramilitary organisation of Albanian separatists into a civilian defence corps. According to the earlier set deadline, the KLA should have disarmed itself by last night.

September 19

  • Today is the final day for demilitarization of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army, or the KLA. A spokesman for the international security force in Kosovo, KFOR, has said the KLA has so far handed over only 10 thousand weapons. Observers point out that before the deployment of KFOR the KLA had more than 30 thousand well-armed fighters. The command of NATO-led KFOR has allowed the KLA fighters to keep part of their weapons.
     
  • A book containing information and photos about Kosovo published in Belgrade a few days ago indicates that more than 70 Serbian Orthodox monasteries have been destroyed by ethnic Albanian extremists after the deployment of KFOR. Nearly ten thousand icons and five thousand church artifacts and hundreds of bells have been stolen. The book contains detailed information and photos about the destruction of 52 religious monuments from June till August.

September 18

  • During a visit to the United Nations headquarters a delegation of the so-called "Kosovo Liberation Army" is going to discuss the details of transforming the KLA into a national security service, and also the issue of KLA's representation at the United Nations. This came in a statement at a news conference in New York on Friday by the KLA leader Hashim Thaqi. He also said that in the future KLA would press for independence for Kosovo, and would form its own government once free and democratic elections were held in a new state.

September 17

  • The creation of a television and radio news broadcast service has started in Kosovo and it will begin to function on Sunday. Reportedly, this step was authorized by the United Nations mission in Kosovo and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. This service will broadcast programmes in Serbian and Albanian languages for two hours a day. The European union of radio broadcasting services based in Geneva received the permission to create the service. According to experts, professional and independent public information service may play an important role in establishing peace and law and order in Kosovo.

  • Russia insists that the United Nations Security Council resolution on a settlement in the Serbian province Kosovo must be strictly observed. This came in a statement on Thursday by the Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov owing to the refusal by the terrorist "Kosovo Liberation Army" to abide by the resolution and its plans to press for a separation of Kosovo from Yugoslavia. Ivanov said that the KLA should comply with the world community demand to fully disarm itself and integrate into normal civilian life. The Russian Foreign Minister warned that the creation on the KLA basis of any paramilitary structures, whatever name these might take, could give up a political settlement in Kosovo for lost.

September 16

  • The leaders of the Kosovo Liberation Army with Hashim Thaqi at the head on Tuesday signed a declaration on the province's secession from Yugoslavia at an international conference near Washington. Under the document the KLA will be transformed into a national defense force. US Secretary of State Madileine Albright presided over the conference which was organized by the Institute of Peace.

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  • Russian foreign minister Igor Ivanov and United Nations emissary in Kosovo Bernard Couchner agreed in Moscow Wednesday that moves must be made for the full realization of the UN Security Council resolution on Kosovo. The Security Council is calling for the full disarmament of what is known as the Kosovo Liberation Army and an end to arbitrary actions against civilians in Kosovo. Ivanov and Couchner have told newsmen in Moscow that there was a good chance for settling the Kosovo problem.

September 15

  • Russia is deeply concerned over plans by NATO's peacekeeping command in Kosovo to transform the armed separatist grouping Kosovo Liberation Army into para-military police corps. At a news conference in New York Russia's permanent representative in the United Nations Sergei Lavrov rejected such plans as unacceptable since they meant that the KLA would preserve its military structure. He expressed concern over decisions by Kosovo's transitional administration to issue temporary identity cards, set up an alternative customs service as well as other moves that had not been coordinated with the Yugoslav authorities. Russia qualifies these steps as a departure from the UN Security Council resolution on Kosovo, especially the clauses concerning respect for the sovereignty and integrity of Yugoslavia.
     
  • The United States has taken one more step in support of the so-called self-determination of Kosovo. At a conference of ethnic-Albanians in Washington State Secretary Madeleine Albright announced the opening of an American mission in Pristina. The mission will actually perform the functions of an embassy. The conference has declared Kosovo's secession from Yugoslavia the objective of the Kosovo Albanians.

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  • The 54th session of the UN General Assembly got under way in New York on Tuesday. The session is attended by representatives of 185 countries, and the Russian delegation is led by Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov. The agenda of the session features a wide range of problems, including guaranteeing international security, disarmament, a settlement of regional conflicts, fighting terrorism, stable economic development, human rights, reforming the United Nations. The Russian delegation plans to lay emphasis on securing the central role that the UN plays in maintaining international peace.
     
  • The United States has made another step to supporting Kosovo's "self-determination", as it were. As the US State Secretary Madeleine Albright addressed a conference of ethnic Albanians in Washington on Tuesday, she announced the opening an American representative mission in Pristina. The US President's adviser on Kosovo James Dobbins specified that the mission would operate as an embassy, by which he meant the person who would run the mission, and also the fact that the mission would have a political, military and other departments. The conference adopted a declaration to point out that the goal of Kosovo Albanians is the separation of Kosovo from Yugoslavia.
     
  • The head of the UN civilian mission to the Serbian province Kosovo Bernard Couchner is to arrive in Moscow later today on a brief working visit. He will meet Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov to discuss the situation in Kosovo. Russia rejects some of Couchner's "initiatives", including his plan for the transformation of the "Kosovo Liberation Army" into the "National Guards". According to a source in the Russian Foreign Ministry, the Russian delegation to the UN General Assembly will press for action on the Security Council resolution on that the KLA should be fully demilitarized. Russia is also concerned about the trend that's taken shape towards Kosovo's separation from Yugoslavia.
     
  • An official spokesman for the United Nations Secretary-General has said that Kofi Annan is worried about the fact that the humanitarian situation in Yugoslavia has largely worsened. The expert-gathered data prove that the number of people in the Union Republic of Yugoslavia that badly need aid has largely risen of late. The Yugoslav economy is in dire straits following the recent fierce NATO bombing raids on that civilized European country.

September 14

  • Russia may raise the issue dealing with the further deployment of its peacekeepers in Kosovo, as the head of the department for International cooperation of the Russian defence ministry General Leonid Ivashov said earlier today. He says that this may happen should Kosovo's breakaway from Yugoslavia become inevitable and also should any limitation be put on the United Nations' activities in the settlement of the Kosovo problem. Leonid Ivashov has noted that the deployment of the Russian peacekeepers in Kosovo was sanctioned by the upper house of the Russian Parliament. The peacekeepers were facing concrete tasks on the implementation of the resolution of the UN Security Council on Kosovo, he emphasized. However, as the general noted, none of the clauses of the resolution, that was adopted by the UN Security Council, is being implemented, that's why the Federation Council has sufficient grounds for raising the issue concerning the withdrawal of the Russian peacekeepers from Kosovo.
     
  • One Serb was killed and two were wounded in the east of Kosovo, when some unidentified gunmen fired at a group of Serbs in locations near the Ranilug Settlement, at a distance of 15 kilometres from the city of Gnilane. This incident occurred on Monday night, as a spokesman for the KFOR force said earlier today. The dead bodies of two Montenegrian women were discovered in one of the houses in the city of Pec in Kosovo's west. The killers have not yet been identified. The terror, which the Kosovo separatists unleashed against the non-Albanian population of the Kosovo Province in mid-June when the NATO forces were deployed in Kosovo, is still in progress there.

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  • The Russian Defence Minister Igor Sergeyev warned that the process of stabilizing the situation in Kosovo and the implementation of the UN resolution on a peace settlement in the region had been endangered. The Russian Marshal said this on Monday during his talks with his American counterpart William Cohen. The Russian Defense Minister said it was not international peace-keepers who had a decisive influence on the turn of events in Kosovo but the separatist Kosovo Liberation Army. As Russia sees it, a monoethnic independent state is being created in Kosovo. In addition, non-Albanians in the region are not properly protected.
     
  • Continuing the NATO policy of flagrant interference in the Yugoslav affairs the European Union has taken a decision on the so-called targeted humanitarian aid to those Serbian towns and communities which are upholding the pro-Western position. The opposition leaders were recently invited to the EU headquarters in Brussels. The EU and NATO policy has the aim of toppling down the Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic and creating the so-called friendly regime in Belgrade. With this in view European Union refused to lift the oil embargo and other economic sanctions against Yugoslavia which had been introduced during the NATO aggression.

September 13

  • China has demanded that the United States should give a more reasonable explanation of its bombardment of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade in May. Then three Chinese nationals died. The statement has been made today by the Chinese Foreign Minister Tan Tszyasuang during news conference in the city of Auckland. Earlier Washington claimed that the bombing of the Chinese embassy was a mistake since NATO used outdated maps during its military campaign against Belgrade.

  • The command of the NATO international force in Kosovo has postponed by "several days" the re-settlement of Albanians in the Serb-populated part of the city of Kosovska Mitrovica. This is the last city in Kosovo where the Serbian community is still quite large after dozens of thousands of Serbs fled Kosovo to escape the terrorist activities by Albanian extremists. On Thursday and Friday the Albanians tried to force their way into the Serb-populated residential quarters. 150 people were injured in the clashes. In a statement for the France Press news agency spokesman for he UN mission to Kosovo who asked not to be identified questioned the expediency of re-settling Albanians among Serbs now. He stressed that the political objective sought to be attained could result in a major bloodshed.

September 12

  • At least 150 people are known to have received wounds and injuries over the past two days as angry ethnic Albanians in Mitrovica in northern Kosovo tried to force their way into a neighbourhood populated by Serbs. While doing so, they heavily clashed with French patrolmen on a bridge across a dividing river. The French say many of the casualties in their ranks were caused by bullets fired from the rioting mob. Part of Mitrovica is under control by peace-keepers from Russia.
     
  • The Russian Defence Minister Marshal Sergeyev and his US counterpart William Cohen will devote much attention to Kosovo when they meet in Moscow on Monday. They will also discuss how to rebuild defence ties broken off following the outbreak of the latest NATO war against Federal Yugoslavia. Mr. Cohen arrived in Moscow on Sunday night.

September 11

  • On Friday night 36 people were injured in the city Mitrovica, in the Yugoslav province Kosovo. Among them, - 28 Albanians, 4 Serbs and 4 French servicemen. According to reports from Mitrovica, the incident occurred when units of the international peacekeeping force KFOR tried to stop, near the bridge in the city centre, a group of Albanians Kosovans who had been forcing their way to the Serb-populated area. This is not the first incident near the Mitrovica bridge which separates the city into the Northern and Southern parts, - Serb- and Albanian-populated respectively.

September 10

  • A NATO spokesman says several armymen and civilians have beenwounded in hand grenade explosions in the city of Mitrovitsa controlled by the French battalion of the international peacekeeping contingent. The hand grenades were hurled in a clash between ethnic Serbs and Albanians, last night. The fighting broke out on a bridge across the river that separates two ethnic communities.
     
  • United Nations emissary in Kosovo Bernard Kushner has arrived in New York and briefed UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on the latest developments in Kosovo and his mission's efforts. Kushner is bent on turning the Kosovo Liberation Army into a kind of a national guardforce. Russia rejects his plans and insists on the implementation of the United Nations decision to disarm the Kosovar paramilitaries.

  • The Yugoslav Foreign Minister Zhivadin Jovanovic will press for the efforts to fully carry out the Security Council resolution on Kosovo in the course of another UN General Assembly session due to get under way in New York later this month. This comes in a statement that the Yugoslav Government issued in Belgrade on Thursday. The statement stresses the UN Security Council resolution in question considers Kosovo an inalienable part of the Union Republic of Yugoslavia, formed of Serbia and Montenegro.
     
  • The former deputy Serbian Prime-Minister, leader of the Serbian Radical Party Voijislav Sesel has said in Belgrade that joining the Russian-Byelorussian Union is of strategic importance to Yugoslavia. According to him, he discussed Yugoslavia's joining the Union of Russia and Byelorussia with the deputy Russian Foreign Minister Alexander Avdeyev, who was on a visit to Belgrade recently.

September 9

  • A plan by the head of the United Nations civil mission in Kosovo Bernard Couchner designed to transform the Kosovo Liberation Army into a National Guard is unacceptable for Russia. Speaking to the Russian news agency ITAR-TASS, a senior Foreign Ministry official announced this on Thursday. He emphasized that at the coming UN General Assembly session Russia would demand that the resolution on demilitarization of the KLA be fully complied.
     
  • A Serbian woman has been beaten to death by the KLA militants in the southwestern city of Prizren. According to a KFOR official, the incident took place Wednesday evening. In a separate incident in the same evening in the southern town of Suva-Rika a 65 years-old Gypsy woman was shot to death, by, according to NATO sources, people wearing KLA uniform.

  • United Nations civilian emissary in Kosovo Bernard Couchner is going to New York where he will present to the United Nations plans for the transformation of Kosovo Liberation Army into a National Guard. The deputy commander of the international peacekeeping contingent in Kosovo French General Jean-Claude Toman told newsmen in Pristina Wednesday that the 3,000-strong Kosovar guard force would be provided with automatic rifles. Russian deputy foreign minister Alexander Avdeyev said in Belgrade the KFOR-KLA plans could hardly be accepted by the international community.
     
  • The Hague-based newspaper Alhemein Dahblad has quoted the Dutch military as feeling the Albanian separatists who are blocking approaches to the Kosovo city of Orakhovats are damaging their own interests. The peacekeepers are expected to enter Orakhovats. The separatists have made it impossible for that city to receive humanitarian aid for children, who are bused to school from surrounding villages, to get schooling.

September 8

  • Yugoslav leaders appreciate Russia's assistance in finding a way out of the current difficulties. The Russian First Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Avdeev made the announcement on Tuesday after meeting in Belgrade with President Slobodan Milosevic. According to Mr.Avdeev, President Milosevic thanked the Russian leadership for its economic and diplomatic support and spoke highly of its efforts to guarantee implementation of the UN Security Council resolution on Kosovo.
     
  • Two Serbs are reported to have been killed and four wounded as a result of 10 powerful explosions in the east of Kosovo last night. The incident took place in the American sector on the outskirts of a Serbian village situated 5 kilometres from the city of Gnilane. A KFOR representative in Pristina has said the village is believed to have come under mortar fire.

  • The Russian Defence Ministry official General Leonid Ivashov has said that Russia is not content with course of the international peacekeeping operation in Kosovo. He was speaking in Moscow after the Russian representative to NATO's headquarters in Brussels had, for the first time since NATO launched its aggressive operation against Yugoslavia, met NATO officials in the framework of the Joint Standing Bilateral Council. According to General Ivashov, Moscow has limited cooperation with NATO by the interaction on Kosovo. He also said that he was discontent with the degree of NATO's KFOR command cooperation with the Russian contingent. Meanwhile on Tuesday in Berlin the basic figure behind NATO's aggression against Yugoslavia American General Wesley Clarke spoke positively of this cooperation in Kosovo and said that it allegedly "provided a powerful impulse for a peaceful settlement in the province".

September 7

  • The Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov believes the member nations of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe must take coordinated steps to restore normality to Yugoslavia, including the province of Kosovo. He told this to his Norwegian colleague Knut Vollebeck, the current chairperson of the OSCE. They held several hours of talks in Moscow on Tuesday. Much of their attention went to a draft Charter on European Security to be discussed by the next OSCE summit in Istanbul in November.
     
  • NATO Secretary General Javier Solana says the Kosovo Liberation Army must lay down arms before September 19th and there are no plans to push back this deadline. He also says the KLA cannot hope to be reshaped into a legitimate civilian force before it disarms. Mr Solana was speaking before reporters in the Kosovo capital Pristina on Tuesday. The KLA commander Hashim Thaqi is known to oppose these demands. He insists the KLA must become a permanent defence force for Kosovo. His position is at variance with Security Council resolutions that call to disband the KLA and keep Kosovo within Federal Yugoslavia.
     
  • The United States `and its allies` recent aggression against Yugoslavia has clearly shown who is its enemy and who is its friend. This is what Yugoslavia`s ambassador to Russia Borislav Milosevic told newsmen. He says that Russia has saved Yugoslavia from destruction. Mentioning the possible establishment of a union between Russia, Byelorussia and Yugoslavia, Borislav Milosevic noted that such a union should be formed, so that they could jointly deal with both the world and regional crises.

  • NATO's secretary-general Javier Solana who authorized the bombardments of Yugoslavia says the Kosovo Liberation Army must play its part in establishing freedom and democracy in Kosovo. Mr.Solana made the statement in Pristina on Monday. The Army headed by Albanian extremists was NATO's ally in provoking the conflict and has been involved in a campaign of violence and ethnic cleansing against non-Albanian population since the NATO-led international force entered the province. Mr.Solana met with the head of the civilian administration in Kosovo Bernard Couchner who is planning to push through the Security Council a decision in favour of the KLA. Russia, meanwhile, demands implementation of the earlier resolutions providing for the disarmament and dissolution of the KLA and Yugoslavia's sovereignty over Kosovo.
     
  • A spokesman for the Russian Defense Ministry General Leonid Ivashov says Russia expressed dissatisfaction over the stabilization process in Kosovo at a meeting of the Russia-NATO military committee in Brussels on Monday. The international forces, the General said, are unable to guarantee security to the Serbs and other non-Albanians. The Russian Military Chief of Staff General Anatoly Kvashnin said in turn that Russia's relations with NATO would largely depend on the developments surrounding a Balkan settlement.
     
  • The Federal Prosecutor of Yugoslavia Vuk Djokanovic has made an inquiry into a precise number of victims to the terror against the non-Albanian population of Kosovo. The inquiry was forwarded to the head of the United Nations mission in Kosovo Bernard Couchner. The General Prosecutor, in particular, requested that he should be provided with the data on ethnic cleansing during the presence of the NATO-led international force in Kosovo. According to the press, no less than 80 percent of the Kosovo Serbs have been evicted from the region.

September 6

  • According to the RIA-Novosti news agency, the Russia-NATO Joint Standing Military Committee will go in session at the North Atlantic alliance's headquarters later today, for the first time since the two sides suspended their relations. Russia's chief military representative at NATO General Viktor Zavarzin and his staff returned to Brussels a week ago. On March 26th this year following NATO's military action against Yugoslavia, the General was recalled to Moscow by the Russian leadership. A spokesman for the Russian embassy to Belgium stressed that at the present moment Russia and NATO would maintain military contact only in the framework of cooperation in peacekeeping operations in Kosovo.
     
  • The Kosovo Serb leaders have demanded that the head of the United Nations mission to the province Bernard Couchner should resign. Speaking in an interview that the Belgrade-based newspaper "Blitz" carried on Sunday, the Kosovo Serb Resistance Movement leader Momcilo Traikovic said that what Couchner had been doing prevented the United Nations from cooperating with the Serbian community in Kosovo. According to Traikovic, the UN mission helps the extremist "Kosovo Liberation Army" in the efforts to separate the province from the rest of Yugoslavia. This is borne out by Couchner's order that the Yugoslav dinar should be replaced with foreign currencies and that a new taxation system should be introduced in Kosovo.
     
  • In the coming winter Yugoslavia will have enough Russian gas for heating and industrial production facility performance. This came in a statement on Sunday by the Serbian Prime-Minister Mirko Marjanovic, following his many-day working visit to Russia. Given the hard economic situation in Yugoslavia Russia agreed to postpone the payment of debt for the previous gas deliveries until the year 2003. According to Marjanovic, Moscow and Belgrade have drawn up plans for active trade and economic cooperation.

September 5

  • Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Avdeyev and other senior Russian diplomats are in the Yugoslav capital Belgrade for several days of discussions on how to preserve Yugoslavia's territorial integrity and introduce more democracy into its domestic political life. According to the agency ITAR-TASS, Mr Avdeyev is to meet with his hosting colleague Zivadin Jovanovic and prominent figures in the Yugoslav opposition. He may also have a round of talks with President Slobodan Milosevic.
     
  • Three thousand Serbs in the village of Smoluze south of the Kosovo capital Pristina woke up this morning to explosions of hand grenades tossed into their houses by members of ethnic Albanian gangs. The attack caused serious damage and left several villagers injured. One grenade went off near a vehicle of the Kosovo Force. The intensity of anti-Serb violence in Kosovo continues to grow despite heavy presence of NATO-led troops. Of the once thriving Serb population of nearly 200 thousand, 170 thousand have fled Kosovo since June the 12th when foreign soldiers started to move in.

September 4

  • Russia is not satisfied with the situation that is taking shape in Kosovo. This came in a statement by the Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov on his arrival in the Georgian capital Tbilisi on September 3. It would be wrong to consider the "Kosovo experiment" as it were, as successful. The way used to settle the crisis in the Serbian province has gives rise to numerous problems. According to the Russian Foreign Minister, the ending of NATO bombing raids failed to prove conducive to alleviating tension in Kosovo. Igor Ivanov says he sees the "Kosovo model" as unacceptable to be used for a settlement in the Caucasus.
  • An elderly Serb was killed last night in the center of Pristina in a terrorist act. A bomb was exploded by some unknown people near his apartment's door, as the British KFOR representative reported. An Albanian woman and her two children, who lived upstairs, were lightly wounded. Few hours before the incident one of the leaders of U. N. Mission in Kosovo Dennis MacNamara said that violence against ethnic minorities in the province is still the main problem for peace there. Most Serbs and Gypsies have already left the province, where the acts of terror by Albanian extremists against them have increased since KFOR was introduced.
  • KFOR servicemen have found a large depot of weapons in the western part of Kosovo. In the village of Rogovo, 10 kilometers from the border with Albania, 250 submachine guns, 50 machine guns, and a large amount of other arms and explosives were found. This was reported in Pristina by a KFOR representative. He didn't specify who were the owners of the depot. During the Kosovo conflict, one of the channels for smuggling arms from Albania for the separatist Kosovo Liberation Army was near Rogovo.

September 3

  • United Nations emissary in Kosovo Bernard Kushner has put into circulation in Kosovo the Deutschemark, the US Dollar, the Swiss Franc and other western currency units. Western news agencies see this move as one more step toward Kosovar independence of Yugoslavia. Even though the Yugoslav Dinar remains in circulation, the residents of Kosovo will be expected to pay taxes in, by and large, Deutschemarks. An additional tax will eventually be levied on those who pay taxes in Dinars. The Deutschemark is already dominating the financial market in Kosovo. Earlier it was used in areas controlled by the Kosovo Liberation Army.
  • The Serbian government has accused the Kosovo peacekeeping contingent and the Hague War Crimes Tribunal of attempts to play down what the Albanian extremists are doing to civilians in Kosovo. It cited the murder of 15 ethnic Serbs whose bodies were found in a common grave near the village of Uglar, in the US-controlled zone of Kosovo. Serbian deputy minister of justice Zoran Balinovac said, in Thursday's appearance on national television, that US servicemen unearthed the bodies last July but reports were for a while suppressed on what they found. Washington was reluctant to say the killing took place after the introduction of the peacekeeping contingent in Kosovo. Belgrade-based media editions are saying the bodies of 42 ethnic Serbs have been found near the village of Zlasch in the environs of Pristina. Neither KFOR nor the United Nations mission in Kosovo issued a formal statement on that killing.
  • Head of the self-proclaimed "provisional government" of Kosovo Hashim Thaqi said that the arraignment of gunmen of Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), led by him, by the Hague War Crimes Tribunal is not possible. An interview with Thaqi was published by Belgrade weekly "NIN" on September 3. The KLA leader made it understandable that he had the full amount of trust of the West, by the command of which the Tribunal have organized a "hunting" for Serbs in Kosovo and throughout the whole former Yugoslavia. Explaining why the Western diplomacy have chosen KLA as its main partner in solving the Kosovo problem, Thaqi declared that the Army, besides the "operative actions, since it was started, has paid special attention to political activities". This convinced the international community that KLA is "not a terrorist organization", but an army, oriented for freedom, peace and democracy in Kosovo, Thaqi stated. He also said that Kosovo is lost for Yugoslavia forever.
  • France will continue assisting promotion of tasks, set by the international community in Kosovo. This was declared by French Minister of Defence Alain Richard during his discussion with one of the leaders of Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) Hashim Thaqi on September 3. He also noted Thaqi's declaration that the KLA is going to fulfil its commitments on disarmament completely.

  • The NATO Secretary-General Javiar Solana will visit Kosovo on September 6. The press-service of the Alliance reported this in Brussels on September 3. The visit is aimed at inspecting how the peacekeeping operation is going on in the province and finding out the problems before the international organizations working in Kosovo.

  • The "Kosovo Liberation Army" shall not disarm itself. This came in a statement in Pristina on Thursday by the chief of what is known as the "general staff" of the Kosovo Liberation Army Agim Ceku. Ha was speaking in the wake of his meeting with the German Defence Minister Rudolph Sharping. According to the previously reached agreements, the Albanian separatist formations in Kosovo were to hand in all automatic fire-arms by the 19th of this month. Meanwhile the British newspaper "Guardian" quotes informed western sources as saying that there are plans to transform the Kosovo Liberation Army into a "Kosovo corps". According to the KFOR western participants, the "Kosovo corps" will be armed with light weapons and will be 2,500 to 3,000 men strong.
     
  • Serbia demands that the United Nations Security Council should examine the way action has been taken on the Council resolution on Kosovo. The press secretary of the ruling Socialist Party of Serbia Ivica Danic said in Belgrade that serviceman of some countries that form part of the KFOR peacekeeping force fail to perform their duties they assumed by agreement of the Security Council. The Serbian official demanded that those who fail to cope with the task set, that of guaranteeing security of all residents of the Serbian province, should be withdrawn from Kosovo. On Thursday the deputy Serbian Prime-Minister Vojislav Sesel and a Serbian opposition leader Vuk Draskovic also made sharp-worded accusations against KFOR.

September 2

  • The political leader of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army, Hashim Thaqi, has made a formal acknowledgement of the fact that the KLA has been behind the recent attacks in Orakhovac against the Russian peacekeepers deployed in the province. The ethnic Albanians want out the 750 Russian paratroopers who are to replace the Dutch peacekeepers. The Albanians fear that Russians will side with the nearly 3,000 ethnic Serbs who have stayed behind in Orakhovac.

  • Moscow is urging the international community to put an end to the violence in the Serbian province of Kosovo. The Russian foreign ministry said there was no end to the killings of ethnic Serbs, Montenegrins and Gypsies by ethnic Albanians, in that province. The homes of representatives of ethnic minorities are put to fire and Serb, Montenegrin and Gypsy property is stolen. Moscow is calling for meeting in full measure the United Nations Security Council demand for the disarmament of the Kosovo Liberation Army.
     
  • One more common grave has been found with the bodies of Serbs slain by Albanian separatists after the introduction of an international peacekeeping contingent in Kosovo. Deyan Batskovic of the Pristina Center Peace and Tolerance Center says Serb hostages were held in the school building of the village of Zlash. Forty two of them were subject to an act of violence. Thirteen ethnic Serbs were killed, in a separate case, in the US-controlled zone of Kosovo.

September 1

  • NATO Commander in Europe US General Wesley Clark has praised the Russian contingent in Kosovo for professionalism and even-handedness in dealing with clashes between members of opposing ethnic groups. There are 36 hundred Russian peace-keepers in Kosovo. They are part of a larger international force numbering 40 thousand.
     
  • The Serbian Prime-Minister Mirko Maryanovic has arrived in Moscow with a 5-day visit. According to the Interfax news agency, the two sides will focus on the situation in Kosovo where Albanian extremists continue their violence against other ethnic groups and refuse to implement the UN Security Council resolution.
     
  • Russia will continue to play an important role in a Bosnian settlement and will carry on with the policy. The announcement was made by Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov after his meeting today with the UN High Representative in Bosnia-Herzegovina Wolfgang Petric. Moscow, the minister said, helps to implement the Dayton peace accords. In the absence of violence in the past four years, Bosnia is now taking steps to create local government bodies.

  • The former Chief of the Yugoslav General Staff General Momcilo Perisic has said in an interview with the French newspaper "Le Figaro" that the international community should put an end to the ethnic cleansing of Serbs that's under way in Kosovo. General Perisic was sacked in November last year for disagreement with President Slobodan Milosevic's Kosovo policy. In July this year the General said he was joining the opposition. According to Momcilo Perisic, the International peacekeeping force in Kosovo should be especially careful to avoid creating a dangerous precedent in the region by giving preference to Kosovo Albanians.

August 31

  • The new American Ambassador to the UN Richard Holbrooke praises the role of Russia in settling the crisis over Kosovo. He also says the region's quarrelsome ethnic groups must learn to live in harmony with each other. Mr Holbrooke was speaking at a news conference in Pristina on Tuesday at the end of a three-day visit which included meetings with commanding officers of the Kosovo Force, officials of the provisional UN administration for Kosovo and leaders of the Kosovo Albanians and the Kosovo Serbs. Chief of staff of the Kosovo Liberation Army Adjim Cheku informed Mr Holbrooke of separatist plans to reshape the KLA into a regular defence force for Kosovo. Mr Holbrooke's visit to Kosovo is part of a ten-day tour of the Balkans which is also expected to take him to Macedonia, Albania and Bosnia.

_______

  • Members of the UN Security Council have condemned the continuing violence against civilian population and KFOR servicemen in Kosovo and demanded that the violence stop immediately. Its Chairman Martin Andzhaba of Namibia made the announcement after the Council's meeting on Monday. The issue of Kosovo was raised on initiative from Russia with a view to stop the separatist Kosovo Liberation Army from seizing power in the province and take more drastic measures against Albanian militants who refuse to comply with the Council's resolutions.
     
  • Despite statements made by high-ranking representatives of the KFOR international force and the United Nations that the situation in Kosovo has stabilized, daily reports from the province say violence there continues with mass killings of Serbs, fires set to their houses and ethnic cleansing against the non-Albanian population. According to the Centre for peace and tolerance, five corpses were found in Prizren last weekend including the body of a beheaded elderly Serb woman. Albanian extremists in Prizren beat to death a 60-year-old Gypsy and 67-year-old Serb. Nine Serbs have been taken hostage in Prizren since August 25th. Ten houses have been burned in the village of Ortokol and a school in the village of Maklo not far from Prizren.

 
 


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