Kosovo violence highlights UN failings

By Nick Thorpe BBC correspondent, Mitrovica

Hundreds of Serbs have been evacuated by peacekeepers

Extra peacekeepers are being sent to Kosovo after several days of violence which have cost more than 30 lives. With many Albanians impatient for independence from Serbia, the UN administration seems to lack the will to take on the extremists behind the violence.

Has the international community been dragging its heals when it comes to helping the region establish a stable infrastructure?

We entered Kosovo under the sign of the cross - a small, wooden Orthodox cross dangling from the rear view mirror of the car which brought us here from Belgrade.

The River Ibar flowed beside us, sometimes a lazy green, sometimes a rushing, troubled torrent carrying a load of newly melted snow down from the mountains, its banks still white with the early morning frost.

On this northern approach road to the flashpoint city of Mitrovica, all the settlements are Serbian.

The lettering is mostly Cyrillic and few of the cars bother any more with registration plates.

People drive fast in and out of Serbia across what a nervous policeman at the roadside called simply, an "administrative border".

There is a feeling of lawlessness, of desperation and of dogged resistance in the air. The Serbs are trying to hang on to the last bit of Kosovo where they are still in the majority.

This time the Serbs are the victims...last time it was the Albanians...in Bosnia, it was the Muslims

The road into Mitrovica passes a huge metal works, its windows broken, a giant brick chimney reaching to heaven. Slag heaps are bleeding industrial waste into the streams which run into the Ibar.

This is not the picture postcard Kosovo, beloved of Serb romantics in Belgrade. This is Soviet-inspired heavy industry, now dead or dying, as in so many other former communist countries.

Dividing line

Arriving in Mitrovica, we suddenly reached the main bridge, the epicentre of the ethnic conflict which has long plagued Kosovo, and which this week took such a virulent form.

Ethnic conflict, ethnic cleansing and all their brother and sister phrases roll so easily off the analytical tongue. But they always add a sense of even-handedness to an uneven situation.

This time the Serbs are the victims. Last time it was the Albanians. In Bosnia, it was the Muslims. You have to call a spade a spade, though these stumpy sentences too conceal huge generalisations.

Camouflaged Kfor armoured cars, full of French troops, block the bridges on both sides - the predominantly Serbian north and the mainly Albanian south.

Gathering in small groups in the bars and cafes near the bridge, and spilling out onto the glass-strewn pavements outside, Serbs listen with dismay to the UN Security Council resolution calling on all sides to stop fighting.

"We're not attacking them", says Svesdan, a local photo journalist, "they are attacking us".

The French soldiers, armed to the teeth and wearing riot helmets, are facing the wrong way, he suggests.

The Albanians will sooner or later try to storm across from south to north. The Serbs are not crazy enough to try to cross to attack them.

Terror raids

News comes in from all over Kosovo of Serbs in much smaller enclaves than this one being driven from their homes, of churches and houses burned by Albanian mobs.

BK Television, beamed from Belgrade, already has a new montage, with dramatic music and video clips from the past days. "Terror in Kosovo" is the headline. "If we call it terror", someone wonders, "will President Bush declare war on it and come to our aid?"

Graffiti outside the burnt-out Archangel monastery reads " Death to Serbs"

In the offices of the Serbian National Council, close to the bridge, I met 32-year-old Father Gurman, abbot of the Orthodox monastery of Archangel, near Prizren in the west of Kosovo.

He was on business in Mitrovica when the trouble started. His 14th Century monastery was burnt down on Tuesday night and his fellow monks were evacuated by German Kfor troops who gave them refuge.

"I would like to tell you something", says Father Gurman proudly when the interview is over. "All the other monks are younger than myself. In times of danger, while some people flee, others have chosen to come here."

He does not blame all the Albanians, just the extremists. The United Nations organs which have run Kosovo for nearly five years, and Kfor, could have prevented all this trouble by tackling the extremists, he says.

A provisional government exists, a provisional assembly, a provisional police force

He is probably right and the story from Bosnia is familiar. There radical Serbs have remained in prominent positions or have not been pursued in hiding. But that is because they are still admired within their own communities.

Outlook

NATO commanders have taken the easy option in both countries and left them alone with dire results for the moderate majority.

Now Father Gurman - in black beard, black cassock and tall, black cylindrical hat - is waiting for a lift back, if not to his ruined monastery, then at least to his beleaguered monks in a camouflaged Kfor jeep with escort, if the man on the telephone can persuade the peacekeepers to offer him one.

What next in Kosovo?

Some progress had been made towards rebuilding a multi-ethnic society under the United Nations' clumsy, but well meaning, hands.

The Albanians have failed their biggest test

A provisional government exists, a provisional assembly, a provisional, somewhat multi-ethnic, police force.

But the provisional nature of all these institutions, and the reluctance of the international community to bite the bullet and tackle the issue of Kosovo's future, are at the root of the latest violence.

To me, it had long seemed that independence for Kosovo was inevitable. Less so now.

The Albanians have failed their biggest test - to prove they can protect their minorities.

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From Our Own Correspondent was broadcast on Saturday, 20 March, 2004 at 1130 GMT on BBC Radio 4. Please check the programme schedules for World Service transmission times.