War in the Balkans: Diplomacy - Peace Mission Set for Dead End

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THE LATEST peace mission of the Russian envoy Viktor Chernomyrdin had barely begun when Yugoslavia seemed to wreck it by insisting yestesday that any international peace-keepers in Kosovo must be unarmed - a condition flatly rejected by the Nato countries.

A Belgrade foreign ministry spokesman said that his country would consider a United Nations-led force if one was approved by the Security Council. But, he said, it must be unarmed - in other words, much the same as the international monitor force that spent five months in Kosovo before the Rambouillet conference collapsed and Nato began bombing on 24 March. The offer was immediately dismissed by the White House last …