Belgian peacekeepers caught up in weekend rioting in Kosovo were held prisoner by a Serb mob for three hours and lost weapons and ammunition, a NATO spokesman said Monday.
Six Belgian troops from Kosovo's NATO-led peacekeeping force and a civilian employee were surrounded by about 200 protesters and forced from three vehicles Saturday, during protests in the Kosovo Serb town of Leposavic, 30 miles (50 kilometers) north of Pristina.
"They were released after the Belgian commander negotiated with the crowd," Major Steven Shappell, chief spokesman for the KFOR force said, "They also lost two rifles and 150 rounds of ammunition."
In Saturday's rioting, which was provoked by the arrest of a Serb motorist by civilian police, two Serbs died, one from gunshot wounds, the other of a heart attack. Their funerals were to be held Monday, local people said.
The commander of the Belgian KFOR contingent, Lieutenant Colonel Rik Koumans, told reporters in Leposavic Sunday that the fatal shot had been a warning shot fired by one of his men that "ricocheted."
But on Monday Shappell said the investigation into what happened was still continuing and that it was possible that one of the stolen rifles was fired in the confusion.
The Belgian Defense Minister, Andre Flahout, called a crisis meeting of senior commanders in Brussels following the incident.
The Belgian military is extremely sensitive about the safety of its troops after 10 of its peacekeepers were captured, tortured and killed in April 1994 during a United Nations mission to Rwanda.
Following the riot in Leposavic in which the UN police station guarded by Belgian troops was severely damaged and the three military vehicles burnt out, the United Nations has pulled its civilian police, both international staff and Serb officers, out of the town, UN spokeswoman Susan Manuel said.
A second demonstration in the town by around 500 Serbs on Sunday was more peaceful that on Saturday, but a UN vehicle was nevertheless set on fire, she added.
The Serb whose arrest sparked the disturbance, Vladimir Tomovic, is due in court in the nearby town of Kosovska Mitrovica on Monday, she said, where he is expected to be charged with reckless driving -- PRISTINA (AFP)
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