From the Washington Post
Yugoslav media and witnesses quoted by news agencies said the bus was hit in an air attack, apparently by a missile. NATO officials confirmed the reports. U.S. and other NATO spokesmen said the bridge was not on the alliance's target list, but a NATO military source in Brussels said, "This doesn't mean it didn't happen."
Accounts of the death toll ranged as high as 60, the number reported by the private news agency Beta. A Reuters reporter who visited the scene quoted Pristina police officer Dragan Petrovich as saying at least 34 people were killed, including 15 children.
Dozens of bodies and body parts, including a child's arm, were scattered near the bridge, Reuters said. The charred bodies of at least two children could be seen.
The bridge was not destroyed. "They did not hit anything but the bus," said Rajko Maksic, 45, a farmer who saw the attack. "I heard a plane and then I heard a blast. I saw falling bodies. I heard screams," Maksic said. "This is a horror. All I can think about were the children that I saw."
The bus attack was one of the costliest in civilian casualties since NATO began its air campaign on March 24. Allied officials say care is taken to avoid hitting civilians, but in the past five days stray bombs have hit civilian residences in Belgrade and the southern town of Surdulica. Also Saturday, in attacks on bridges in pro-Western Montenegro, four civilians were reported killed, including two children aged 10 and 12. |
