SPPWRT (Serbs Pelting People With Rocks Topic) - Serbs Pelt Peacekeepers with Rock

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Bad, Bad Serbs

KOSOVSKA MITROVICA, Yugoslavia (AP) - A crowd of angry Serbs pelted American and German peacekeepers with rocks and bricks Sunday during a massive house-to-house search for illegal weapons in this tense, ethnically divided Kosovo town.
The weapons search was a bid to halt a spiral of violence that has been building since Feb. 2, when two Serbs died in a rocket attack on a U.N. bus. Nine people have been killed and dozens arrested in violence since in Kosovska Mitrovica, which is divided into predominantly Serb and predominantly ethnic Albanian sides of town.
French Lt. Col. Patrick Chanliau, a spokesman for the NATO-led peacekeeping force, said soldiers from a dozen countries found no weapons in the southern section, where mostly ethnic Albanians live.
In the Serb northern part, where the Americans and some Germans came under attack from an angry crowd, he said soldiers found plastic explosives, 15 rifles and handguns, one grenade, one machine gun and loads of ammunition.
One person was arrested. Those injured included two American peacekeepers, one with a broken nose and one with a chipped tooth, and three Serbs, he said.
About 2,300 troops, including French, Americans, Germans and Canadians, set out shortly after dawn to conduct the major search operation on both sides of the Ibar River, which divides the town, said Lt. Cmdr. Philip Anido, a NATO spokesman.
Peacekeepers' helicopters circled above Kosovska Mitrovica, dropping leaflets that read: "Attention! Attention! KFOR (Kosovo Force) soldiers are here to search for weapons. Hand over your weapons when asked to do so by KFOR soldiers. Do not impede KFOR operations. KFOR soldiers will treat you with dignity and respect."
The troops went from house to house and building to building, searching through areas where the peacekeepers suspect there may be weapons and criminal activity, Anido said.
The Americans, who were searching in the Serb north of the city, met with an increasingly hostile crowd that began throwing snowballs at their armored vehicles. Later, the crowd hurled stones and broken bricks. The hail of rock continued as the Americans drove south toward the ethnic Albanian section of town hours later.
Serb officials bitterly complained about alleged acts of violence and intimidation committed by the Americans. Defying the 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. town curfew, about 200 Serbs stood in protest for an hour Sunday evening on their side of the river, next to the main bridge.
"Americans were smashing doors, destroying furniture. There was no reason for such behavior," said Oliver Ivanovic, a local Serb leader. Earlier in the day, Ivanovic said the Americans had broken all the doors in a student dormitory and also searched for weapons in the north side's children's hospital.
But U.S. spokesman Capt. Russel Berg called the troops and the U.N. military police who assisted them "very disciplined."
"There was no action on the part of the American soldiers" that would have incited a confrontation with the Serbs, he said.
Thousands of ethnic Albanians were killed by Serb forces during Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's 18-month crackdown against separatists here. After NATO bombing forced the Serb troops to withdraw last spring, ethnic Albanians began attacking Serbs as revenge.
With so many Serbs and ethnic Albanians living in the same community, Kosovska Mitrovica is the most ethnically mixed city in the province - and the most violence-prone. Chanliau said the weapons searches would continue until Gen. Klaus Reinhardt, the German commander of the peacekeeping force, is satisified that the job has been done.


-- Laughing Ninny (bad@news.here), February 20, 2000

Answers

Good training for the troops, now they will know what to do when the helos fly over your house and drop leaflets demanding that you hand in your guns.

-- Its (All@conspiracy.com), February 20, 2000.

Oh my.... =(

-- Dee (T1Colt556@aol.com), February 20, 2000.

Did our police learn from nato how to kick down doors ,or did nato learn this from our police?I suppose to them that is treating people with respect and dignity.They didn't kill or rape them so it must be alright.Our police used to treat us with dignity and respect,but that is definitely in the past now.If you lie to a police officer it is a crime,if they lie to you its good police work.And they wonder why they are called pigs!

-- just a thought (tigerpm@netscape.com), February 21, 2000.

just how many serbs were killed by the NATO bombing

how much damage did they inflict on the country

just how close to WWIII were we

of course like y2k, it didn't happen, but it nearly did

-- dick of the dale (richard.dale@unum.co.uk), February 21, 2000.


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