KOSOVO: US STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN RUBIN VISIT (2) скачать в хорошем качестве

KOSOVO: US STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN RUBIN VISIT (2)

(13 Mar 2000) English/Nat U-S State Department Spokesman James Rubin has been in Kosovo to pound home Washington's message that violence in Kosovo must end. He urged ethnic Albanians to stop attacks on Serbs and other minorities before extremists shatter the international support that ended Belgrade's repression last year. James Rubin, U-S State Department spokesman and Christopher Hill the U-S Ambassador, toured the southwestern Kosovo town of Djakovica on Monday. Their agenda was simple - to focus attention on the issue of thousands of ethnic Albanians still unaccounted for following the Kosovo war. Nine months after fighting between Serb-led Yugoslav forces and ethnic Albanian rebels ended the issue of the disappeared is a burning issue. Hundred of ethnic Albanians awaited the U-S officials bearing photos of the disappeared. For many the visit unleashed an outpouring of grief. Rubin met privately with an ethnic Albanian family that has six male members unaccounted for. He said Washington would keep the issue of missing Albanians on the international agenda. Rubin added that stories of atrocities proved that NATO and the U-S were right to intervene in the war-torn province. SOUNDBITE: (English) "What we've seen in the destruction and the stories the horrible stories reminds us of why the United States and NATO were forced to act and why we acted to protect Kosovo from this kind of oppression and destruction. SUPER CAPTION: James P. Rubin, U-S State Department spokesman Rubin was sent by Secretary of State Madeleine Albright on a diplomatic offensive. His message to the Kosovo Albanian leadership? That they risk losing international goodwill and support if violence against Serbs, Gypsies and others continue. Earlier in the day, he'd visited the province's most volatile city - Mitrovica - to underscore U-S concern over ethnic violence there. There he met U-N and ethnic Albanian leaders. Violence between Serbs and Albanians has dramatised the failure of the U-N mission to bring the rival ethnic communities together nine months after NATO-led peacekeepers arrived here. But he did not cross the Ibar River to visit the Serb-controlled north of the city. Serbs there had said they would greet Rubin with stones and showers of eggs if he ventured into their part of town. Serbs want the industrial city to remain a part of Serbia, the dominant republic of Yugoslavia. He reiterated U-S support for co-existence between the opposing communities. SOUNDBITE: (English) "But we have to remember that for Belgrade for President Milosevic every day that's a bad for the Serbs in Mitrovica is a good day for him. He doesn't care what happens here to the Serbs he only wants to show that the international community isn't fighting. We are the ones that care about coexistence, we are the ones that are working to try to create the conditions for coexistence and our message to Kosovar Albanians and to Serbs is don't let the extremists work against you." SUPER CAPTION: James P. Rubin, U-S State Department spokesman Rubin's visit coincided with release of a report by Amnesty International sharply critical of the NATO and U-N mission in Kosovo. The report accused peacekeepers and U-N police of failing to respect international human rights standards in trying to suppress unrest in Kosovska Mitrovica. Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter:   / ap_archive   Facebook:   / aparchives   ​​ Instagram:   / apnews   You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you...