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NATO to Return More Kosovo Part to Yugoslavia
NATO will allow Yugoslav forces back into a further section of the five-km-wide security zone that surrounds Kosovo, a NATO official said Tuesday.
The area, known as Sector D, runs from a point opposite Ogoste in eastern Kosovo to a point level with Medvedja in southwestern Serbia, the official who remained anonymous said.
The commander of the NATO-led KFOR peacekeepers in Kosovo will be allowed to release the territory to Yugoslav forces from April 12, a NATO spokesman said.
The precise timing of the operation will depend on talks between KFOR and the Yugoslav government.
The move, approved by NATO ambassadors on Tuesday, is the latest phase of the plan to allow a gradual return of Yugoslav forces to the buffer zone which the 19-member NATO imposed when it entered Kosovo in June of 1999.
The official said the area contained some ethnic Albanians. " But there has been very little trouble in the area and we don't expect any," he said.
Over the past year, ethnic Albanian guerrillas have been using some sections of the so-called Ground Safety Zone as a safe haven from which to launch operations against Serbian forces. The Yugoslav forces have now been allowed back into most of the buffer zone surrounding Kosovo.
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