http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23237000/from/id/23292107Serb protesters attack U.N. police in Kosovo
Serbian prime minister appeals for calm on fifth day of demonstrationsKOSOVSKA MITROVICA, Kosovo - Serbs protesting Kosovo's independence attacked U.N. police guarding a key bridge in northern Kosovo with stones and empty glass bottles Friday.
Some 5,000 Serbs rallied in the Kosovksa Mitrovica, waving Serbian flags and chanting "Kosovo is ours!" in a fifth day of protests since Kosovo's ethnic Albanian leaders declared independence last weekend. However, U.N. police did not fire tear gas as earlier reported. Blasts at the rally came from firecrackers launched by protesters.
Serbia's prime minister appealed for calm as the European Union condemned rioting in the capital Belgrade overnight when demonstrators attacked the U.S. embassy and other Western mission. The United States and EU heavyweights Britain, France and Germany have formally recognized Kosovo.
Serbian President Boris Tadic called an emergency meeting of the national security council, saying the riots that engulfed the capital overnight must "never happen again."
In Serb-dominated northern Kosovo, demonstrators waved Serbian flags and chanted "Kosovo is ours!" Police tried to keep protesters off the Kosovska Mitrovica bridge over the Ibar River. The bridge, which divides Kosovo Serbs from ethnic Albanians, has long been a flashpoint of tensions in Kosovo's restive north
Kosovo's ethnic Albanian leaders declared independence from Serbia on Sunday. The province, which is 90 percent ethnic Albanian, has not been under Serbia's control since 1999, when NATO launched airstrikes to halt a Serbian crackdown on ethnic Albanian separatists. A U.N. mission has governed Kosovo since.
Prime Minister Hashim Thaci said Friday the violence was reminiscent of former Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic's bloody crackdown on ethnic Albanian separatists in Kosovo.
One dead, 150 injured
Serbian police said one person died and more than 150 people were injured in unrest Thursday, which erupted after a state-sponsored rally. Nearly 200 people were arrested and 90 shops ransacked, police said in a statement.
On Thursday, nearly 200,000 demonstrated in downtown Belgrade against Kosovo independence. Rioters stormed the U.S. Embassy and set fire to offices and police guardhouses on the sidewalk in front of the building. The nearby Croatian embassy was also attacked, and a residential building next door was damaged by fire.
Firefighters extinguished the blazes and found a charred body inside the U.S. mission's consular section.
On Friday, a McDonald's restaurant in the city center was still smoldering from the fire that torched much of the interior. Shops put up plastic sheeting and glass panels to cover their smashed front windows. Several sports goods stores and other shops had been cleaned out by looters leaving display windows completely bare.
The White House also strongly criticized the Serbian government, saying the U.S. Embassy in Belgrade "was attacked by thugs" and Serb police did not do enough to stop it. In a conference call with reporters from Air Force One, presidential spokeswoman Dana Perino said the United States had expressed its "concern and displeasure" to the Serbian government.
The riots were the first major outburst of anti-Western sentiment in Serbia since Milosevic was ousted in 2000 and replaced by a reformist government.
Coalition government under pressure
The tensions have exposed a deep rift within the country's shaky coalition government, raising fears that nationalist anger over Kosovo was strengthening the hard-liners who want to move Serbia away from the European Union and closer to its traditional ally Russia.
The EU warned Serbia that the attacks risked harming efforts to bring the Balkan nation closer to the EU.
"These acts of violence lead nowhere and they cannot help anybody," said EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana. He told reporters that negotiations on an agreement designed to prepare Serbia for eventual EU membership would have to wait until things "calm down."
Pro-Western politicians in Serbia accused hard-line nationalists in the government of Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica of inciting the violence.
In Kosovo, Prime Minister Thaci said the violence harkened back to the Milosevic era.
"The pictures of yesterday in Belgrade were pictures of Milosevic's time," Thaci said during an interview at his office in Pristina. "What we saw were terrible things."
Some Belgrade analysts said the nationalists were seeking to fuel anti-Western anger in order to sideline pro-European Union reformists led by the Tadic.
Tadic's and Kostunica's parties are united in a coalition government that has ruled Serbia since mid-2007.
But the two differ sharply on how to handle Kosovo's independence, with Tadic saying Belgrade must press on with efforts to join the EU regardless of Kosovo, and Kostunica seeking to drop the bid because most EU countries plan to recognize the province's independence.
Appeal for peace
Kostunica appealed for an end to the violence.
"This directly damages our ... national interests. All those who support the fake state of Kosovo are rejoicing at the sight of violence in Belgrade," he said. But he made no mention of the damaged embassies.
Police said that in addition to the U.S. and Croatian embassies, the missions of Turkey, Bosnia, Belgium and Canada were also targeted.
Defense Minister Dragan Sutanovac of Tadic's EU-oriented Democratic Party said rioters were energized by the backing of some nationalist politicians for smaller attacks earlier in the week against Western embassies and commercial interests.
The pro-Western Liberal Democratic Party leader, Cedomir Jovanovic, warned the rioting was a prelude for a crackdown against government critics and pro-Western liberals.
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