Visit our website: HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK ---------------------------------------------
TWO POLICEMEN KILLED IN TERRORIST ATTACK IN SOUTHERN SERBIA
BUJANOVAC, Aug 6 (Beta)-Police sources in Bujanovac have confirmed to
BETA that two members of the Serbian Interior Ministry were killed and two
were wounded in an attack by Albanian terrorists on a police station in the
village of Muhovac, in southern Serbia, around 16 kilometers north-west of
Bujanovac. The attack took place around 10 p.m. on Aug. 3.
These sources could not give any details concerning the attack, nor could
they specify whether the attackers suffered any losses. Muhovac is situated
inside the ground safety zone, where Serbian security forces returned this
spring. The village is inhabited by Albanians.
Around 150 people from the village protested last week, during the erection
of a police checkpoint near the village. In their plan for resolving the
crisis in southern Serbia, the Yugoslav authorities have envisaged
installing 22 such checkpoints in the crisis area.
As part of the investigation into the murder of the two policemen and the
wounding of two other, on the morning of Aug. 4 the police brought nine
villagers in for questioning and afterwards released them, Belgrade-based
Radio B92 said.
The radio also said that the attack on the police was "most probably"
carried out by the people from Muhovac, former members of the Liberation
Army of Presevo, Medvedja, and Bujanovac and the fighters of a radical group
led by Muhamed Xhemaili.
In a statement to the France Presse news agency, Xhemaili, however, denied
any connection with the attack. "I do not know who did it," Xhemaili said,
adding that he regretted the loss of lives.
Serbian Deputy Premier Nebojsa Covic visited the site of the attack on the
morning of Aug. 4 and told the locals that he did not want to hear any more
stories of human rights, because they would not respect them
themselves."This is pure terrorism and it should be dealt away with by all
means available," Covic said and called on the local Albanians to cooperate.
The district public prosecutor in Vranje said on Aug. 5 that investigating
bodies still knew nothing about the perpetrators of the attack in Muhovac
which left two policemen killed.
The vice president of the Party for Democratic Action, which gathers
Albanians in southern Serbia, Behluj Nasufi, said on Aug. 5 that
investigating bodies in Muhovac had searched the houses in the village,
following the murder of the two policemen.In a statement to BETA, he
confirmed that nine Albanians from Muhovac were taken in for questioning and
later released and that the police did not use violence during the search.
Nasufi condemned the murder of the two policemen, adding that his
compatriots in the municipalities of Presevo, Bujanovac, and Medvedja "want
the case to be solved and the truth established."
On Aug. 5 KFOR also strongly condemned the murder of the two Serb policemen
near Bujanovac and denied allegations that the attackers came from Kosovo.
KFOR spokesman Roy Brown said that it was "the Serbian authorities'
responsibility to establish and control peace and order in the safety zone
in the Presevo valley."
Since the ground safety zone was set up around Kosovo, on June 9, 1999, in
the crisis municipalities of Bujanovac, Presevo, and Medvedja in southern
Serbia around 68 people were killed, out of whom, including the latest
attack, 14 were policemen.US EMBASSY DENOUNCES KILLING OF POLICEMEN
BELGRADE, Aug. 6 (Tanjug) The US Embassy in Belgrade has
denounced the attack on Yugoslav policemen in the Serbian village of
Muhovac, in which two policemen were killed and two wounded.
The embassy statement, sent to Tanjug Monday, said that such
attacks were not only to be denounced, but were counterproductive, because
they were a threat to a process which had recently begun in southern Serbia,
the process of reconciliation and rebuilding of confidence.
The statement also said the embassy offered its condolences to the
families of the killed policemen.
------------------------------------------------- This Discussion List is the follow-up for the old stopnato @listbot.com that has been shut down
==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9spWA Or send an email To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] This email was sent to: [email protected] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
