NATO Troops Tear Down Serb Blockades

NATO troops Thursday smashed through three roadblocks set up by Serbs in Kosovo to protest tax collection checkpoints established by the U.N., but Serbs said they erected new blockades nearby.

Serbian media in Belgrade reported that a 62-year-old woman died en route to a hospital after inhaling tear gas thrown by NATO troops and that a man lost a hand when he picked up a stun grenade and tried to throw it back at peacekeepers.

Officials with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization said they could not confirm either report, but a United Nations official, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed that a woman died.

The roadblocks were destroyed “to reestablish freedom of movement for all people of Kosovo,” said squadron leader Roy Brown, a spokesman for the peacekeepers.

Roadblocks were removed near the towns of Zvecan, Zupce and Loziste, French 1st Lt. Francis Megerlin said in Kosovo, a province of Serbia, Yugoslavia’s main republic.

Serbian media reported that new roadblocks were erected near where the others were dismantled.

Serbs are incensed because the province’s U.N. administrators set up a new tax collection checkpoint Sunday on a road into northern Kosovo, where the province’s remaining Serbs are concentrated. The checkpoints are used to collect taxes on goods being shipped into the province.

Serbs charge that the move will drive up prices and that such checkpoints suggest that Kosovo is an independent state--something the Serbs reject.