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Al-Ahram Weekly 8 - 14 April 1999 Issue No. 424 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 8 - 14 April 1999 Issue No. 424
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Focus Profile Features Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Fuel to the flames
NATO underlined its rejection of Yugoslavia's offer of a unilateral cease-fire in Kosovo with another night of heavy air raids, saying yesterday it had successfully attacked armoured columns for the first time.Two thunderous explosions shook Pristina yesterday morning as NATO forces struck targets in the Kosovo capital, residents said.
A NATO official said the armoured vehicles were attacked during the daytime on Tuesday, in the alliance's first direct strike against units involved in carrying out the mass expulsion of ethnic Albanians from Kosovo under the orders of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. The NATO official said alliance warplanes had also struck at other strategic targets, including an explosives factory which Serbia described as a chemical works. He said all NATO aircraft returned safely to base. The raids came amid renewed efforts by Russia to end the two-week-old NATO bombing campaign.
There was uncertainty over the fate of some 40,000 ethnic Albanian refugees who until Tuesday had been stranded in a no-man's land on the Yugoslav-Macedonian border. Reporters yesterday found the area completely empty except for piles of garbage. Yugoslavia closed the main border crossing from Kosovo into Albania early yesterday and told refugees it was safe for them to return home, Western monitors said.
US officials have rejected an announcement by the Belgrade government that it was marking Orthodox Easter with a unilateral cease-fire from Tuesday evening, as well as offering to allow refugees to return to Kosovo. President Bill Clinton insisted that Milosevic should accept all demands made by NATO. "Mr Milosevic could end it now by withdrawing his military police and paramilitary forces, by accepting the deployment of an international security force to protect not only the Kosovar Albanians... but also the Serbian minority in Kosovo," he said.
A spokesman for the Yugoslav Foreign Ministry, appearing on US television, insisted, however, that Belgrade would not accept foreign troops on its soil. "We don't need foreign troops," he said. "We are not accepting any foreign troops on our soil. No NATO, no UN, no any other umbrella," Nebojsa Vujovic said on ABC's Nightline programme.
Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov was quoted as saying President Boris Yeltsin had sent a message to several foreign leaders yesterday with proposals to try to end the conflict.
Serbian state television reported a number of civilian deaths overnight when it said NATO missiles exploded in a residential area of Kosovo's capital, Pristina. "There are both dead and injured. It was the most severe attack on civilians in Pristina," the television said. The report could not be independently confirmed, however.
According to the Yugoslav state news agency, Tanjug, two strong explosions rocked Novi Sad, northern Serbia's largest city, after NATO missiles hit a fuel depot and a garage at the oil refinery near the city at 2.45am (0045 GMT) yesterday. The television showed huge flames lighting up the sky over Novi Sad -- a constant target since the alliance started bombing two weeks ago.
Tanjug said the industrial area of the southern city of Nis came under attack at 4.40am (0240 GMT), and that at least 10 powerful explosions were heard in the area.
Yugoslav state television, meanwhile, announced that all Yugoslav army units in Kosovo were complying with cease-fire orders. Yugoslav officials said refugees, who have flooded into neighbouring countries, recounting how they were expelled from their homes and saw relatives murdered by Serb forces in Kosovo, would be welcomed back. One official said an amnesty might be declared for the separatist Kosovo Liberation Army.
French President Jacques Chirac said a European Council meeting on 14 April should consider an emergency plan to help Albania, Macedonia and Montenegro deal with the 430,000 refugees the UN says have fled Kosovo since strikes began on 24 March.
The no-man's-land at the border between Macedonia and Yugoslavia, where international aid agencies said at least 40,000 Albanians were stranded on Tuesday, was completely deserted yesterday. It was not immediately clear whether the Macedonian authorities had changed their position and brought the refugees into the country, or had sent them elsewhere. Another possibility was that the refugees, hearing about the cease-fire offered by Belgrade, had gone back to their homes.
Washington called for Belgrade to "release" moderate Kosovo Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova, in a first indication that the United States believes he is being held by Yugoslavia. Rugova was the subject of intense controversy last week when he was shown on Serb television meeting Milosevic, apparently calling for an end to NATO air strikes.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan accused the Yugoslav government of committing genocide against the ethnic Albanian Kosovars. A UN Human Rights Commission was meeting in Geneva under the "dark cloud of the crime of genocide", Annan said. He urged Yugoslav authorities to respond to NATO's comments on the cease-fire offer.
The acting president of Cyprus, Spyros Kyprianou, said Milosevic had offered to hand over to Nicosia three US soldiers captured by Serb forces a week ago. Kyprianou quoted Milosevic as saying that, in a "goodwill gesture", he was ready to transfer the three soldiers to the Cyprus government, which would then hand them to the US Embassy in Nicosia.
