Albanians from Kosovo police start patrolling Serbian border

The Kosovo police have started to patrol the region's administrative border with Serbia, the UN mission in Kosovo's capital Pristina reported. The patrolling, however, is carried out together with the international peacekeeping force in Kosovo, KFOR, and the UN police. Albanian policemen so far may carry only guns, yet later they are to be armed with sub-machine guns.

The leadership of the Albanian Kosovo police considers the start of patrolling the Serbian border as "a historic moment", it said. KFOR military men, serving with Albanians and being in contact with Yugoslavian frontier guards, say that so far no problems have arisen.

Albanian police are supposed to start 24-hour patrolling of the border soon, but at the first stage patrolling lasts for a few hours a day.

Earlier Kosovo police already patrolled the border of the region with Montenegro, Macedonia and Albania together with KFOR.