Serbs continue Kosovo protests

MITROVICA, KOSOVO — NATO peacekeepers reopened two demolished border checkpoints between Serbia and northern Kosovo on Wednesday as thousands of Serbs protested Kosovo’s independence.

For three days, Kosovo’s Serbs have shown their anger over Sunday’s declaration of independence by the ethnic Albanian leadership, destroying United Nations and NATO property, setting off small bombs and staging noisy rallies.

Chanting, “We won’t give up Kosovo,” about 3,000 demonstrators marched to a bridge in this tense city dividing the two communities. U.N. police sealed off the bridge and NATO helicopters hovered overhead.

Protesters expressed their anger over the swift recognition of Kosovo’s independence by world powers, including the U.S., France, Britain and Germany. Britain appointed David Blunt as its ambassador to Kosovo on Wednesday, formalizing diplomatic relations. Blunt has been head of the British office -- now the British Embassy -- in Kosovo’s capital, Pristina, since January 2006.

Some demonstrators Wednesday carried the flag of Spain, a European Union nation that has refused to recognize Kosovo for fear it will encourage independence movements at home.

On Tuesday, protesters demolished two crossings separating Kosovo from Serbia and torched U.N. border patrol cars, but North Atlantic Treaty Organization troops reopened the roads Wednesday, which they had sealed for about 24 hours out of concern that Serbian militants could cross over to fight in Kosovo.

New makeshift border checkpoints will be staffed by NATO and U.N. police rather than ethnic Albanian police officers, local officials said.

Kosovo, which is 90% ethnic Albanian, has not been under Serbia’s control since 1999, when NATO launched airstrikes to halt Serbian attacks on ethnic Albanian separatists. A U.N. mission has governed Kosovo since, with more than 16,000 NATO troops and KFOR, a multiethnic force, policing the then-province.

But Serbia -- and Kosovo’s Serbs -- refuse to give up Kosovo, which is considered the cradle of Serbs’ state and religion.