An influential Serb leader accused NATO peacekeepers Tuesday of shooting two protesters in the back during weekend rioting.
He said the peacekeepers had fired more than 15 bullets during the incident in the northern Kosovo town of Leposavic.
Oliver Ivanovic, the head of the Serbian National Council in Kosovska Mitrovica, was due to hold talks Tuesday with NATO troops and UN officials to try and calm the situation in Leposavic, where two Serbs died in riots.
But he told AFP that people there were still "very angry" and that reconciliation would take time.
"The reaction of KFOR (Kosovo's NATO-led peacekeepers) was inappropriate. More than 15 bullets were fired into the crowd. And what is very interesting is that these two guys got bullets in the back. They were not attacking," he said.
A UN police investigator told reporters Monday that the dead man was hit in the back by a bullet, but he had no information as to who had fired it.
One of the men injured by gunfire when protesters attacked a UN police station guarded by Belgian KFOR peacekeepers later died, the other is in hospital in what police describe as a "grave" condition. A third Serb died of a heart attack, suffering from "shock", Ivanovic said.
UN police and KFOR have launched an inquiry into Saturday's events, in which rioting erupted after police arrested a Serb motorist and protesters burned three Belgian military vehicles and attacked a police station.
The commander of the Belgian troops in Leposavic, Lieutenant Colonel Rik Koumans, told reporters Sunday that his men had fired warning shots and that one had "ricocheted" and hit a protester, but KFOR has since refused to confirm this, and said inquiries are still being carried out.
Six Belgian peacekeepers and a civilian KFOR employee were taken hostage by the crowd for three hours during the fighting and two of their rifles were seized, KFOR spokesman Steven Shappell said, adding that it was possible one of the stolen rifles was fired by a rioter in the confusion.
UN police spokesman Dmitri Kaportsev said Monday that police had heard reports that at least one bullet was fired at the police station from the crowd.
All UN police patrols have been stopped in Leposavic, a town with an almost entirely Serbian population, and the damaged police station is out of use until officers' "safety can be assured," UN spokeswoman Susan Manuel said -- PRISTINA, Yugoslavia (AFP)
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