Italian Peacekeepers Break Criminal Gang in KosovoThe Kosovo-based Italian peacekeepers announced Thursday that they have broken an ethnic Albanian criminal gang made up of members from the former illegal armed group, the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). Ten gang members were said to have been arrested.According to the Yugoslav Tanjug news agency, the ten suspects were arrested under the charges of illegally possessing weapons and conducting organized crime. The Italian peacekeeping troops launched a surprise search on Wednesday in ten living quarters of the gang members in the southeast border area of Kosovo, in which they found four semi-automatic rifles, one automatic rifle, one sniper's rifle and more than 50,000 German marks (about 22,800 U.S. dollars) in cash, said the news agency. The Tanjug quoted a spokesman for the Italian peacekeeping troops as saying that a large number of KLA uniforms were also found in the above operation. The gang members were suspected of being involved in three murders taking place between last December and January this year, said the news agency. |
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