Kosovo Agreement Could Stave Off NATO Airstrikes

PARIS —  Facing imminent attack from NATO’s bombers, fighters and cruise missiles, Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic agreed to withdraw troops from violence-racked Kosovo province and allow wide-ranging international verification in a last-minute compromise that could end the threat of airstrikes.

But the U.S.-led military alliance, wary of Milosevic, intensified the pressure early today, authorizing the first airstrikes in as little as four days if he does not follow through.

“Balkan graveyards are filled with President Milosevic’s broken promises,” President Clinton told reporters in New York.

U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke, who held what had originally seemed to be last-chance talks in Belgrade, the Yugoslav capital, with Milosevic, flew to Brussels on Monday evening to report to NATO Secretary-General Javier Solana and ambassadors from the 16 member countries of the Western alliance.

According to NATO sources, Holbrooke said a forum originally founded to narrow the East-West divide of the Cold War--the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe--will be allowed by Milosevic to deploy 2,000 observers in Kosovo, an ethnic Albanian enclave inside Yugoslavia’s republic of Serbia, to ensure that the minority’s rights are safeguarded.

Monitoring will be carried out by “a robust, on-the-ground and in-the-air verification system,” Clinton said.

“We will remain ready to take military action if Mr. Milosevic fails to make good on his commitments this time,” the president said.

White House Press Secretary Joe Lockhart said that no U.S. combat forces will be involved in the monitoring of compliance but that some U.S. civilians may be members of the verification force carrying out what Clinton said would be “an intrusive, international inspection.”

If Milosevic follows through, the deal would represent a major eleventh-hour concession by Yugoslavia to the United States and its allies, who are pressing for an end to the brutal crackdown that Milosevic launched in February against the separatist Kosovo Liberation Army.

At least 270,000 people in Kosovo have fled their homes, and hundreds of people have been killed.

On Sept. 23, a U.N. Security Council resolution demanded the Yugoslav government declare an immediate cease-fire, withdraw its forces and enter a political dialogue with the ethnic minority Albanians.

Clinton announced that Milosevic had agreed to abide by that resolution.

On Monday night, Holbrooke refused to reveal details of his negotiations to reporters but said he would be returning to the talks today in Belgrade, which is also the capital of Serbia. It was unclear exactly what needed to be worked out yet with Milosevic. Holbrooke also met briefly with Bronislaw Geremek, Polish foreign minister and chairman of the OSCE.

“We think we’ve had some movement from Belgrade in recent days and hours, and we’re going to return there to see if we can build on that,” Holbrooke said as he left for Belgrade. “We’re going right now . . . directly to the airport.”

Russian news agencies quoted Russian Defense Minister Igor D. Sergeyev as saying that Milosevic offered to allow 1,500 observers into Kosovo and that Russia, a traditional friend and ally of Yugoslavia, intended to participate.

Diplomatic sources in Brussels said Milosevic also was reportedly ready to make a “unilateral declaration” about the status of Kosovo.

A senior White House official said that Holbrooke had achieved some important progress during his meeting with Milosevic but that sticking points remained. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the United States still wanted NATO to tighten the squeeze on the Yugoslav leader by formally transferring command of the air flotilla assembled over the past days to the ranking U.S. general in Europe.

Such an “activation order,” one NATO official explained, would allow Wesley Clark, a four-star American general who is supreme allied commander in Europe, to independently commence air raids.

“The pistol is on Slobodan Milosevic’s temple. It’s going to be loaded and the safety taken off,” a diplomat told Agence France-Presse in Brussels.

After hearing Holbrooke, the ambassadors from the NATO member countries took a brief recess, then reconvened early this morning to approve the activation order, which could lead to airstrikes in 96 hours, or four days.

Sources in NATO said Holbrooke himself asked for the four-day delay, apparently to give himself and Milosevic time to negotiate further--but also to force the pace.

To bring Milosevic to heel, the United States has contributed 260 aircraft, two-thirds of the force earmarked for the strikes. They include around 130 fighters, two long-range B-2 Stealth bombers, a dozen F-117 Stealth fighter-bombers, six B-52s in England, F-15 and F-16 fighters based in Italy and Germany, as well as F-14s aboard the aircraft carrier Eisenhower in the Mediterranean.

A dozen other NATO members have allocated another 170 aircraft, ranging from around 40 French Jaguars and Mirages to three F-16s from Portugal.

According to the International Institute of Strategic Studies in London, the Yugoslavs have 79 MIG aircraft of various vintages, eight surface-to-air missile batteries and at least 100 surface-to-air missiles with a range of as far as 10 miles.

In New York, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan telephoned Milosevic and urged him to comply with the Security Council resolutions. According to Annan’s spokesman, Fred Eckhard, the Yugoslav leader said he was “in the process of complying, or trying to come into full compliance, with the Security Council resolutions.”

Events throughout a tense, uncertain day continued to demonstrate the broad ramifications military action against Yugoslavia might have. Russia recalled its top diplomat and military representative from the alliance’s Brussels headquarters, and Prime Minister Yevgeny M. Primakov declared the airstrikes could “throw relations between NATO and Russia back a long way.”

The Russians protested that the Western military alliance had not received explicit backing from the U.N. Security Council for action against Yugoslavia, a fellow Slavic state. For the West to bypass the United Nations and take matters into its own hands could trigger “international chaos,” Russian Foreign Minister Igor S. Ivanov said.

Americans, meanwhile, were urged by a State Department advisory to leave Yugoslavia. Germany shuttered its Belgrade embassy, becoming the latest in a string of countries to close down its mission in the Yugoslav capital.

The outgoing government of German Chancellor Helmut Kohl became one of the last NATO members to endorse military action in the conflict when the Cabinet approved the activation order.

“Now, things are serious,” said Klaus Kinkel, foreign minister in Kohl’s government.

According to NATO sources, if the first strikes, mostly with Tomahawk cruise missiles, did not succeed in forcing the Yugoslavs to give ground, Clark could proceed on a five-stage campaign of air raids in consultation with Solana. After each stage, the sources said, the American general would have to come before NATO ambassadors to receive permission for the next. Thus the alliance’s member governments would keep control of the process and could halt the attacks if they believed the Yugoslavs were willing to obey the Security Council resolution.

“The strikes will be against military targets, aimed at arms and weapons dumps, military airports and logistical centers,” French Defense Minister Alain Richard said.

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Dahlburg reported from Paris and Gerstenzang from New York. Times staff writers Craig Turner at the United Nations, Carol J. Williams in Berlin and David Holley in Belgrade contributed to this report.