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Pastimes : Kosovo -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: George Papadopoulos who wrote (17435)	3/8/2001 9:25:56 AM
From: George Papadopoulos	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 17770

They are baaaack... dailynews.yahoo.com NATO Lets Serbs Into Buffer Zone By Douglas Hamilton BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The NATO (news - web sites) allies agreed on Thursday to allow the controlled return of Serbian security forces to a buffer zone along a part of the Macedonian border where ethnic Albanian gunmen have occupied territory. ``Do not expect an overnight blitz,'' a military source cautioned. NATO would oversee Serbian deployments into territory that has been off-limits to the Yugoslav Army since NATO fixed the buffer zone around Kosovo in June 1999. The commander of the NATO-led KFOR peacekeeping force in Kosovo, COMKKFOR General Carlo Cabigiosu of Italy, would keep a tight check on the reins as well-armed Serbian forces move back to an area where only policemen with pistols have been allowed. ``The North Atlantic Council has today agreed to certain measures including....authorizing COMKFOR to allow the controlled return of (Yugoslav) forces into the Ground Safety Zone in a narrow sector next to the border with...Macedonia,'' a NATO Secretary General George Robertson said in a statement. ``...COMKFOR should at this stage retain authority over the GSZ and Air Safety Zone,'' he specified. How Deep And When To Be Determined The Serbian forces would be given the green light to move into the five-km (three-mile) wide zone where it adjoins the border with Macedonia, leaving an unguarded gateway which has been exploited by ethnic Albanian gunmen. Ethnic Albanian separatist forces occupied a stretch of the buffer zone in southern Serbia last year and began launching attacks on police in the Presevo Valley. Recently, gunmen seized adjacent Macedonian land, apparently exploiting the gate created by NATO's no-go order to Belgrade. The depth of the Serbian deployment to plug this gap, whether one km or deeper, was still to be settled, NATO sources said. Timing remained also remained to be agreed. Military sources noted that a carefully coordinated operation would be required in the border triangle area, considering there would be KFOR troops to the west, Macedonian army forces to the south and Serb forces entering from the east with a hostile force in the middle. ``We don't want any mistaken firefights,'' said one. The sources said the operation would require planning and aerial surveillance, which has been hampered by recent bad weather. They estimated the number of armed rebels operating on the Macedonian border at no more than 200. Cabigiosu would also determine the level of armament Serbia should deploy. Military sources said it was likely to include armored vehicles and possibly helicopters but not tanks. The rebels are armed with heavy machineguns and rocket-propelled grenade launchers. They are not believed to possess sophisticated weapons such as shoulder-launched Stinger anti-aircraft missiles. Zone To Be Ceded Soon ``This is a first step in a phased and conditioned reduction of the GSZ,'' the NATO statement said. ``Further controlled return to the GSZ should continue rapidly thereafter in defined sectors, subject to approval of the North Atlantic Council,'' it added, in an apparent reference to 200 miles of buffer zone where there has been no conflict in the past 21 months.. ``Access to the final sector which has seen the most conflict will be authorized by the Council at a later stage,'' Robertson said, apparently referring to the Presevo Valley region where the buffer zone has been occupied by 600-800 guerrillas. NATO's decision follows many warnings to Albanian extremists that their attempts to provoke a conflict will not be tolerated. Robertson noted that three Serbian policemen were killed on Wednesday by a land mine planted in the Presevo Valley, taking the death toll closer to 40 in several months of attacks. His statement also stressed, however, that Serbia's new democratic leadership had promised dialogue with Presevo's ethnic Albanians and other confidence-building measures.