EU:The European Union and the US demanded yesterday that Serbia protect western embassies in Belgrade after several were attacked and one man was killed in a night of rioting fuelled by anger over Kosovo's independence.
Russian officials meanwhile said western nations should have expected such a response to their recognition of Kosovo's sovereignty and warned that Moscow might use "brute force" if the EU or Nato acted against the fledgling state's Serb community.
As workers swept shattered glass and tear gas canisters off the streets of Belgrade, a small group of youths among 5,000 peaceful protesters hurled rocks, bottles and fireworks at police in Mitrovica, the ethnically divided town in northern Kosovo.
"These acts of violence lead nowhere and they cannot help anybody," said EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana. "The embassies have to be protected - that's the obligation of a country," he said, after the US, British, German, Croatian and other missions were attacked in Belgrade.
He added that the violence, and Belgrade's fury over Kosovo's independence, meant it was impossible to continue talks about forging closer ties with Serbia. "We are not at this very moment trying to move that on. Things will have to calm down before we can recuperate the climate that will allow for any contact."
The US also condemned Serbia's failure to protect its embassy, which was a prime target for attack following a massive peaceful protest in Belgrade.
According to a spokesman, senior US diplomat Nicholas Burns told Serb prime minister Vojislav Kostunica that the US "would hold the Serbian government personally responsible for the safety and wellbeing of our embassy employees", and that "the security that was provided was completely inadequate to the task" of protecting the embassy.
The US closed the mission earlier this week following an attack by stone-throwing youths when Kosovo declared independence on Sunday. Diplomats' families may be sent out of Serbia and US embassies across former Yugoslavia have been put on alert.
Serb president Boris Tadic condemned violence in which one man was killed, reportedly a protester caught in the blaze that the mob started in the US embassy.
"There is no excuse for violence. No one can excuse with a single word what happened yesterday. This was not Serbia and Serbia will never be like that," he said.
Russian foreign ministry spokesman Mikhail Kamynin said Moscow "regretted" rioting that injured more than 100 people, but insisted that "forces that supported Kosovo's proclamation of independence should have been aware of the consequences of such a step". Dmitry Rogozin, Russia's ambassador to Nato, said the EU and Nato position on Kosovo could prompt Moscow to "use brute force" to make its voice heard on the issue.
Kosovo police were pelted with missiles in Mitrovica during a fifth day of Serb demonstrations, but no one was hurt. Most of the 5,000 protesters marched peacefully, but a small group that entered Kosovo from Serbia was blamed for the brief trouble.
