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Kosovo: Serbs take defensive stance as NATO strikes intensify
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Serbs
take defensive stance as NATO strikes intensify
MARC ROGERS
Brussels
As
NATO air operations were stepped up last week to target a broad array
of Yugoslav targets, Serb forces adopted a "defensive and concealed posture"
hiding main battle tanks near civilian houses and slowing military activity
in order to conserve resources.
NATO military spokesman Air Cdre David Wilby confirmed the low level of Serbian air defence activity saying that on 7 April only one SA-6 missile was fired "and that a MiG-29 took off but recovered to its home base very quickly".
Summing up the effects of the air campaign after two weeks, UK Chief of the Defence Staff Gen Sir Charles Guthrie said "well over 200 attacks have been conducted against nearly 150 individual sites ... some 50% of [Milosevic's] fighter aircraft have been destroyed ...We have disrupted fuel and ammunition supplies and we have cut their lines of communication in many places and we are attacking them with increasing ferocity on the ground."
NATO spokesman Jamie Shea noted that NATO foreign ministers would "reaffirm" a strong commitment to the air campaign. He repeated earlier NATO statements that no ground operation was envisaged in Kosovo unless "a cessation of hostility occurs".
"I can reassure Russia that NATO is not planning some kind of invasion," he added.
NATO forces are to be reinforced this week with additional aircraft to strike ground targets, including additional infrastructure targets.
UN Secretary General Kofi Anan called on Yugoslav authorities to withdraw forces from Kosovo and accept an international military presence to oversee the return of refugees.
On a visit to NATO headquarters in Brussels, Macedonian Foreign Minister Aleksandar Dimitrov and Defence Minister Nikola Kljusev stressed that Macedonia has only agreed to have 12,000 NATO troops on its territory and only as part of an eventual peace implementation force in Kosovo. Dimitrov said: "The Republic of Macedonia cannot be used for any offensive activities against a neighbouring country, including Yugoslavia" he said adding that neither the number nor the mission of the present troops could be changed without permission.
NATO's foreign ministers are expected to meet on 12 April in order to weigh future strategy alongside new military and political initiatives.
Photo:
A bomb damage assessment photograph issued by the US DoD on
7 April shows damaged vehicles in Kosovo
(US DoD)
Jane's Defence Weekly