Evidence of a fresh Serb atrocity, involving the ambush of a convoy of ethnic Albanian refugees, emerged last night as the British Foreign Secretary, Mr Robin Cook, called an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council for today to condemn the latest massacre.
The session will assemble amid mounting international outrage about the weekend killings of men, women and young children attempting to flee Serb assaults on villages in central Kosovo. Many of the victims' bodies have shown signs of beatings and mutilation.
"This was not an act of war. It was plain cold murder," Mr Cook said at the Labour Party conference in Blackpool. "NATO is now ready to act. Milosevic [the Yugoslav President] would be making a big mistake if he did not recognise the revulsion across Europe at this latest atrocity.
"There must be no impunity for such an act of ethnic hatred. Even today NATO has completed a further phase in preparation for intervention."
Mr Cook also called on the War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague to investigate the massacre. He announced the emergency UN meeting after consulting the United States Secretary of State, Ms Madeleine Albright, and European Union foreign ministers.
The massacres happened after Serbian authorities promised that their troops had withdrawn to barracks and the fighting was over. Mr Slobodan Milosevic was given a fresh ultimatum by NATO which said the Yugoslav Republic would face official judgment for its conduct in Kosovo by October 8th.
In Brussels, NATO officials warned that the allies had finalised plans for air strikes against Serbian targets but more detailed plans for sustained military action were incomplete.
US Cruise missiles have been taken into the region, American military sources said, but no decision has been taken to place them under NATO command.
The Security Council is expected to call for an urgent report from the UN Secretary-General, Mr Kofi Annan, on whether Serbia has complied with last week's resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire.
In Geneva, the widely-respected International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) accused Mr Milosevic of launching a "wanton reign of terror" in Kosovo.
The latest atrocity, the third massacre uncovered within 48 hours, came as Serb security forces tricked a convoy of ethnic Albanian refugees into abandoning their shelter in the mountains and starting their journey home, witnesses said. They then killed four men and looted and burnt their cars and tractors.
The attack took place at the village of Vraniq, about 30 miles (50 kms) south-west of Pristina, the regional capital of Kosovo, a European researcher for the New York-based agency, Human Rights Watch, said. "I saw four bodies. Two men had clearly been executed at close range and one had his nose cut off," he said.