US special envoys, Mr Richard Holbrooke and Mr Robert Gelbard, held fresh talks yesterday with the Kosovo Albanian leader, Dr Ibrahim Rugova, a day after President Slobodan Milosevic of Yugoslavia rebuffed their bid for foreign mediation in the growing crisis in Kosovo.
Mr Holbrooke said after the meeting with Dr Rugova that "the distance between the two sides still remains very substantial".
He said the talks with Dr Rugova were "very useful," and added that they would hold another meeting with Mr Milosevic later yesterday. "We are as always impressed by Dr Rugova's commitment to peaceful non-violent solution of the problem," said Mr Holbrooke.
Dr Rugova told reporters that he had "pleaded again for the independence of Kosovo" in his talks with the US envoys. Ethnic Albanians in Kosovo "must show restraint" but Serbian police and the Yugoslav army must "stop their provocation which threatens to aggravate the situation which is already very dramatic," he said.
The Albanian community "highly appreciates the United States commitment to a political settlement of the crisis," Dr Rugova added. "We are going to continue our talks." Kosovo's mainly ethnic-Albanian population is seeking independence from Serbian rule. A Serbian crackdown in the province since March has left more than 100 people dead. The ethnic Albanians have refused to meet Serb officials for talks unless there is international mediation. Meanwhile, the underground rebel movement yesterday called on ethnic Albanians in Kosovo to "spread the resistance". "The Kosovo Liberation Army (UCK) calls on the Albanian people to stay home, to spread the resistance and act according to the circumstances," said a statement distributed in Pristina.
Meanwhile, a 60-year-old ethnic Albanian onlooker was killed by police in Pristina yesterday during a raid on a student house suspected of harbouring separatist guerrillas, according to witnesses. Two sons of the dead man, Isuf Hadjari, said he was an innocent victim deliberately killed by police in the attack on the ramshackle house next door to his.
The sons said the family was awakened by a commotion at 3.50 a.m. and that their father went to the front door of their house to see what was happening.
"A policeman was in the yard next door and he told my father to step into our garden. When my father came over, the policeman jumped over the wall and fired one shot from his Kalashnikov and my father fell down," said Mr Arben Hadjari (21).
"Then more police in flakjackets and helmets came into the garden and they stood around my father and they shot him many times."
Serbian security forces said they would have a comment on the incident later in the day.
Residents of the area said at least half a dozen people were arrested in houses near the scene of the raid and there were unconfirmed reports that one policeman was wounded.