Serb Rioters Invade Us Embassy

Furious Serbs protesting at western support for Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence set fire to the American embassy in Belgrade last night, as hundreds of thousands of demonstrators converged on the Serbian capital. The attack on the embassy came after hundreds of protesters, watched passively by police, peeled away from the main rally to invade the building in the center of the capital, using sticks and metal bars.

Witnesses described how the doors to the unprotected embassy - closed after being attacked earlier this week - were knocked in and used to start a fire in an office while demonstrators cheered. Firefighters swiftly put out the flames.

A charred body was later found in the embassy. "It was found at the part of the building set on fire by the protesters," an embassy spokeswoman, Rian Harris, said. She said all embassy employees were accounted for. Belgrade's Pink TV said the body appeared to be that of a rioter.

The British embassy also came under attack last night. David Miliband, the foreign secretary, said damage to the building was "limited" and staff were safe. In a statement, he said: "While the Kosovo issue raises strong feelings in Serbia, no cause can justify such displays of violence. We have made clear to the Serbian government that we expect them to fully uphold their obligations to protect our embassy and other diplomatic premises."

The US ambassador to the UN, Zalmay Khalilzad, said Washington would be asking the security council to unequivocally condemn attacks on embassies. "I'm outraged by the mob attack," he said.

Groups of protesters also broke into a McDonald's restaurant and other western-owned businesses in Belgrade.

Police last night also were guarding the independent B-92 television station - viewed by nationalists as pro-western - as youths started gathering nearby.

The rally was the largest since demonstrators filled the streets in 1999 to protest at Nato bombing and stormed the parliament building in October 2000 to oust the nationalist autocrat Slobodan Milosevic.

Papers and chairs were thrown out of the embassy's windows, while one protester climbed up to the first floor of the building, ripped the US flag off its pole and briefly put up a Serbian flag in its place. The attack on the building and the neighboring Croatian embassy followed claims by European defence chiefs meeting in Slovenia that security in the Balkans was "under control".

The rally came after the government ordered Serbian schools closed for the day and the state rail company made free trains available to bring protesters to the capital. Organizers say the rally was intended to demonstrate Serbia's commitment to holding on to the former province of two million people, where ethnic Albanians outnumber Serbs by nine to one.

In the south, protesting Serbs also attempted to attack a third border crossing into Kosovo - at Merdare, 30 miles north of Pristina - after destroying two other border crossings earlier this week and driving off UN personnel and Kosovan police. Several hundred Serbian army reservists, many wearing military fatigues, used rocks and sticks to pelt lines of white helmeted ethnic Albanian riot police who were blocking the border and preventing the Serb demonstrators from surging into Kosovo.