Serb Protesters Set Us Embassy Ablaze in Belgrade

Protesters set fire to the American embassy in Belgrade tonight and then attacked the neighboring Croatian embassy after 150,000 Serbs gathered in the city to demonstrate against the independence of Kosovo.

A charred body was found inside the American embassy after rioters torched an office in the building, an embassy spokeswoman confirmed to the Associated Press. All embassy staffers were accounted for, she said.

Citing police sources, Belgrade's Pink TV station said the body appeared to be that of a rioter who had managed to enter the consular part of the building.

Earlier, riot police fired teargas on the watching crowd of about 1,000 people, and drove armored jeeps down the street to disperse them. Clashes continued between protesters and the riot police in side-streets.

Police officers stood by the closed US embassy as 300 demonstrators attacked the building with sticks and metal bars in a protest against US support for the former Serbian province's independence.

Masked attackers who entered the building tried to throw furniture and papers from the first floor, and appeared to have started the fire from inside one of the offices. The blaze spread across the front of the building.

The building has been closed this week, and the ambassador was at his home, in contact with American officials, a US state department spokesman, Sean McCormack, said today. McCormack urged the Serbian government to protect the embassy.

The state news agency Tanjug said the Bosnian and Turkish embassies were also vandalized.

The main rally in Belgrade went ahead peacefully during the attacks, with participants marching to the city's biggest Orthodox cathedral for a prayer service.

Tens of thousands of Serbs had poured into the square outside the old Yugoslav parliament building in Belgrade as night fell, in a state-sponsored rally. Some waved Serbian flags and carried signs proclaiming "Stop USA terror." One group set fire to a red-and-black Albanian flag, the AP said.

The Serbian prime minister, Vojislav Kostunica, told the crowd that "Kosovo belongs to the Serbian people."

"As long as we live, Kosovo is Serbia," he said from a stage in front of the former parliament building. A huge banner with the same message was draped across the front of the old parliament.

"We'll never give up Kosovo, never!" protesters chanted back.

Children were given the day off school for the event, and the state railway country allowed hundreds of trains to transport people to the rally free of charge.

Earlier today there were minor clashes between Serbian army reservists and Nato-led peace keepers backed by police at a Kosovo border checkpoint.

Several hundred reservists hurled rocks and burned tyres at a checkpoint in Merdare, about 30 miles north-east of Kosovo's capital, Pristina.

The reservists, thought to be veterans from the 1998-1999 war, arrived from the Serbian town of Kursumlija in buses and brought a bulldozer.

Chanting "Kosovo is ours! Kosovo is Serbia", they managed to push through into Kosovo but later dispersed and crossed back into Serbia, UN police said.