Albanian leader is left isolated

AS ETHNIC Albanian insurgents made more inroads on the ground, the major powers still insisted there could be no independence for Kosovo, and urged the Albanians' moderate political leadership to enter talks with Yugoslavia for greater autonomy for the province.

"The ball is in the Albanians' court," the Russian Foreign Minister, Yevgeny Primakov, said in London yesterday, urging a response to the "breakthrough" achieved during Slobodan Milosevic's visit last week to Moscow, when the Yugoslav President agreed - in theory at least - to begin negotiations on more self- government for Kosovo and its 90 per cent ethnic Albanian majority.

Almost simultaneously in Bonn, the German government told Ibrahim Rugova, long acknowledged as the political leader of the Kosovo Albanians, that independence was not possible, and that the best he could hope for was a return of the autonomy which Mr Milosevic had stripped from the province back in 1989.

The exchanges leave Mr Rugova, who advocates a non- violent solution of the crisis, in an almost impossible position. Among his compatriots his credibility decreases by the week, as support for the guerrillas of the Kosovo Liberation Army grows along with their gains against Serb security forces and an ever more beleaguered Serb civilian population. Even Mr Primakov admitted the dilemma: Mr Rugova was "not as powerful as he used to be... the [KLA] extremists are getting the upper hand over him."

Already in control of 30 per cent of Kosovo, the KLA has captured an important coalmine at Belacevac, west of the capital, Pristina, and according to eyewitnesses are carrying out daylight armed patrols less than 10 miles from the city. Serb morale, KLA fighters claim, is crumbling.

Yet Russia and the Western powers grouped in the six-nation Contact Group, while dealing with Mr Rugova, deprive him of his strongest remaining card with his countrymen, by ruling out the outright independence they and he seek.

Speaking after talks with the German Foreign Minister, Klaus Kinkel, Mr Rugova accused the Serbs of ethnic cleansing in Kosovo.

He said the "climate was not right" for talks and reiterated his call for independence. He appealed too for Nato intervention to stop Mr Milosevic's troops and security forces from driving out any more ethnic Albanians on top of the 65,000 to 80,000 already estimated to have fled to Albania proper or the neighbouring republic of Montenegro.

But direct military action by the Alliance now looks much less likely. In Belgrade, as he prepared for a second meeting with President Milosevic inside 48 hours, Richard Holbrooke, Washington's Balkan troubleshooter and the UN ambassador-designate, warned against hopes of a quick fix.

"Don't expect this thing [Kosovo] to be settled in a week," he told reporters. "This isn't the last chance for peace, as some of you are writing." A diplomatic process was under way, and the US would give it its "best shot".