"You don't need to remind me of that," Mr Bakalli said.

Demanding a "yes or no" answer, Mr Milosevic then launched into detailed questioning of Mr Bakalli's role when he was Kosovo leader as well of his alleged links to the Kosovo Liberation Army - the armed group that began fighting for an independent Kosovo in the late 1990s.

Click here for extracts from Milosevic's defence

Mr Bakalli rejected this saying he had only had contacts of a political or diplomatic nature.

Both men were often interrupted by presiding Judge Richard May, who asked Mr Milosevic to give the witness a chance to respond and to stick to the line of questioning and Mr Bakalli to keep his answers short.

Mr Milosevic in turn asked Mr Bakalli about alleged anti-Serb bias in Kosovo's schools, a question which also received an abrupt response from the witness.

"You imposed the curriculum," Mr Bakalli said.

"You imposed the heads of the schools and the faculties."

First witness

Mr Bakalli was the first of up to 350 witnesses called by the UN to give evidence. He took the stand after Mr Milosevic concluded his three-day opening address.

In his testimony, Mr Bakalli, who said he had met Mr Milosevic while trying to calm tension after clashes between Serb security forces and ethnic Albanian guerrillas, testified he had suffered simply by being an Albanian.

Mr Bakalli, now a member of the new Kosovo parliament, said a Serbian security officer told him in 1997 that Mr Milosevic already had a "scorched earth" plan for Kosovo, which allegedly included the levelling of 700 ethnic Albanian settlements.

Mr Milosevic faces charges of genocide in Bosnia, and of crimes against humanity in Kosovo and Croatia.

He rejects the legality of the court and has refused to appoint lawyers to defend him in what is being described as the most important war crimes trial since the Nuremberg trials after World War II.

He is the first former head of state to be indicted before an international tribunal.