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Protesting Kosovo veterans throw firebombs in Pristina

Jul 16, 2009, 12:14 GMT

Pristina, Kosovo - Protesting Kosovo Albanian war veterans threw firebombs at the parking lot of the fledgling country's seat of government in Pristina on Thursday.

Nobody was injured and there were no arrests after the incident, which came after a day of protests for a better status for the war veterans.

Former fighters of the guerrilla Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) threatened to radicalize their protest, saying they would next toss Molotov cocktails at government cars if their demands are not met.

'We will not allow former KLA members to live on the streets and look like beggars,' a veterans' representative, Vesel Aruqi, said in Pristina.

The Albanians are a 90-per cent majority in Kosovo. The KLA launched an insurgency against Belgrade's rule in the latter half of the 1990s, which led to an all-out war in 1999 and, eventually, a NATO intervention against Serbia.

An interim United Nations administration was deployed after NATO ousted Serbian forces from Kosovo a decade ago. Last year, Pristina declared independence from Serbia and was recognized by leading Western nations

Backed by its superpower ally Russia, Serbia has so far blocked Kosovo's promotion in the UN.