Independent news agency FONET has been closed.
BELGRADE - Air Force Deputy Chief-of-Staff for air force and AA defense of VJ general-colonel pilot Ljubisa Velickovic was killed "on the first lines of defense", quote from the statement of VJ information service.
BELGRADE - Security forces
of VJ and MP have received new official identity cards that will
allow them to check identity of any person, hold or arrest any
military personnel or civilian, enter homes and apartments and
to search premises without a warrant issued from the court. They
are also allowed to carry and use firearms and to take any kind
of transportation vehicles if needed. This broad authorizations
are already in use since May 28th. Source of this information
is Belgrade daily paper "Glas Javnosti".
BELGRADE - Serbian state security police has arrested in Belgrade six members of a clandestine ethnic Albanian organisation, who had planned sabotage operations in the Yugoslav and Serbian capital.
The six belonged to the terrorist National Movement of Kosovo, whose armed wing is the ethnic Albanian terrorist organisation calling itself the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), according to Serbian Radio and Television late on Saturday.
Most of the arrested - Petrit and Driton Berisha of Pec, Isam Abdulahu of Dragas, Dritan Medja and Valton Saiti of Prizren and Shkodran Derguti of Pristina (all in Kosovo-Metohija) - were students of the Belgrade University.
During 1998, some members of this clandestine terrorist organisation took part in armed KLA operations in the territory of the Yugoslav republic of Serbia's Kosovo-Metohija province.
The Belgrade group was collecting funds, arms, ammunition, and medical supplies for the KLA, recruiting new members and collecting information about movements and activity of the army and police.
During the month of May, they were plotting and organising terrorist operations, to be carried out in heavily frequented public places in Belgrade in order to sow panic and a feeling of insecurity.
Devices and armament for the purpose were discovered in the homes of some of the members.
Editor's note: Coerced confession and planted evidence are standard methods of police in Serbia. Suspects are beaten, tortured and starved to death in order to sign papers with full confessions written by the police. In order to further demonize Albanians and win public support for ongoing genocide on Kosovo, Milosevic now tries to present all Albanians as terrorists and to spread fear among civilian population in Serbia.
Leader of Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO), Vuk Draskovic stated today that indictment of Hague's Tribunal against Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic represents provocation and called president of FRY not to pay attention and to continue his activity in searching for peaceful solution of Kosovo Crisis. In the statement of SPO information service delivered to the FONET it is said: "Hague indictments are political provocation and pressure with the main goal to derail peaceful initiatives. I hope that the president of FRY, Slobodan Milosevic will ignore these provocations and that he will pledge to even more resolute findings of peaceful solution of Kosovo drama, according to UN Charter and principles of G-8 and in the interest of our people, the state and stability of whole region.
TV Serbia has been "removed" from the satellite by the decision of EUTELSAT association. Because of this decision, picture of TV Serbia will not be visible in Europe and some parts of Serbia.
CETINJE, Montenegro (CNN) -- Thousands of people protested a Yugoslav army clampdown in Montenegro's historic city of Cetinje on Friday, the largest anti-military display to date in Yugoslavia's smaller republic.
Yugoslav troops have reinforced Cetinje, about 30 kilometers (19 miles) southwest of the Montenegrin capital Podgorica. Cetinje has been a haven for draft resisters since Yugoslavia stepped up military conscription after the start of NATO's air war March 24.
Montenegro's pro-Western government has tried to remain neutral in the conflict between Yugoslavia and the West. Montenegrin President Milo Djukanovic has been sharply critical of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. The republic has also been a haven for displaced ethnic Albanians and dissidents from Serbia, the federation's dominant republic.
Friday's demonstrations brought about 5,000 people onto the streets of Cetinje, carrying banners with slogans such as "Milosevic, get your hands off Montenegro" and "We will give our life for this town."
"We must ask ourselves why those (soldiers) walk around our city -- and with what intentions -- while their homes are being destroyed, and their families are in dark shelters," protester Mirko Dapcevic said, referring to NATO's eight-plus weeks of aerial bombardment. "
Yugoslav soldiers avoided the rally. Djukanovic said earlier this week that as many as 45,000 federal troops may be in Montenegro.
Local officials said more than 1,200 Serb reservists, backed by artillery and tanks, arrived this week. Mayor Savo Paraca said Cetinje was effectively under siege as the soldiers trained the barrels of their artillery on the city, Montenegro's former capital.
"The situation is pretty tense," he said. "You never know what the Yugoslav army is up to, but it is impossible to frighten the people of Cetinje."
Many of the local residents own guns, but authorities have asked them to act with restraint.
The demonstrations have badly strained relations between Serbia and Montenegro. NATO repeated warnings Friday that Yugoslavia's Serb leaders were trying to overthrow the Montenegrin government.
"Clearly, there is an indirect attempt to undermine the democracy and constitutional base in Montenegro," NATO spokesman Jamie Shea said Friday. But he said Montenegro was "resisting courageously."
Federal authorities have tried to nationalize Montenegro's police force and have closed the country's borders with Croatia, Bosnia and Albania in recent days.
Montenegrin officials say Yugoslav soldiers have been manning border checkpoints since Monday. The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees says it is urging aid convoys to wait before attempting to cross into Montenegro.
"Three trucks carrying humanitarian aid have been stopped and we have also had difficulty with international staff getting past the check post," said Robert Breen, of the UNHCR staff in Podgorica.
Massacre video matches mass grave evidence
TIRANA, Albania (CNN) -- "Dead men massacred."
That's what Dr. Liri Losci says he saw -- and videotaped -- in the village of Izbica, nestled in the Drenica Valley in Kosovo. One hundred and twenty-seven men, executed, villagers said, by Serb soldiers on March 28.
"The Serbs, came, began shouting, threw us out of our homes and took everything we had," said one villager. "Then they separated the men from the women and children and chased them out of the village. The men were kept back. We were put in three different lines. They began shooting."
Another man continued the story:
"When the Serbs began shooting, I fell on the ground, pretending to be dead," he said. "Slowly I crawled on my stomach towards a small hill and slid down the hill into the bushes."
A third man said he hid in the nearby bushes, unable to move as the Serb soldiers surrounded the village. From his hiding place, he said, he heard their voices and saw their feet. The soldiers were there for two days and then they left, he said.
State Department: Video matches NATO images
The Yugoslav government has denounced the pictures of the alleged massacre as fabricated propaganda.
On Wednesday, however, the U.S. State Department held a special briefing, saying the newly released video matches aerial photographs of suspected mass graves that NATO released last month.
"These kind of episodes have taken place. This is not the only example -- but it is the only time we've been able to match actual videotape with overhead imagery," spokesman James Rubin said.
The combined imagery was being made public, Rubin said, because the United States believes the Serbs are returning to the mass graves to destroy the evidence of their crimes.
The film will be submitted to an international war crimes tribunal at The Hague, Netherlands, Rubin said.
What the doctor saw
CNN was unable to independently verify Losci's pictures, but Correspondent Amanda Kibel sought out Kosovar refugees who said they had escaped the incident.
Losci says he arrived on the scene a day after the killings, pointed in the direction of Izbica by some of the women who had fled the village. Fleeing from the Serbs himself, Losci decided to get a close-up look at what had happened there.
"Dead men massacred, men in three groups in a large valley at the bottom of a mountain," he said. "We saw three groups of dead men, the first two 20 meters apart and another group about 600 meters away. It was dark, and very hard to recognize the people. That night we decided to bury these people. They were our people, and it was the least we could do for them."
Losci said he couldn't sleep more than two hours that night, and returned to the site the next morning. He and a group of other men from Izbica and surrounding areas began organizing the burial of the dead.
Some began to identify the bodies, others to dig graves. Then, Losci says, he decided to film what he had seen. His own camera had been left behind in his burned-out house, but a villager had hidden a video camera in the ground.
Losci used it to tape the macabre scene.
"I wanted the world to know what terrible things were happening here," he said.
Most of the men who died in Izbica were elderly, because the young men fled to the mountains two or three days before, villagers said. They had heard, said the survivors of massacres in other villages, that the Serbs kill only men.
More survivors speak
Sadik Tahiri said he survived by pretending to be dead and then escaping into the mountains.
"Nine Serb soldiers stood in front of us, about five meters away," said Tahiri. "They shouted 'Turn around!' then the commander shouted in Serb two or three times, 'Fire, fire!'"
The soldiers fired, Tahiri said, and everyone fell.
"I fell, too," he said. "One old man fell over my leg. He was dead. Anyone that moved on the ground they shot, too."
Anife Zekaj was forced to leave Izbica, leaving her husband behind. Later, her nephew found her, and told her he had been killed.
"We heard the cries and the shooting," said Feiton Zekaj, who said he was hiding in the mountains. "When we heard the Serbs had left, we went back and found the dead men."
Olivera Zekaj said the Serb troops separated the men from the women and ran the women out of the village.
"We were not more than five kilometers from the village when we heard the machine guns," she said.
The refugees said that when they tried to return to Izbica to see for themselves what had happened, Serb soldiers stopped them along the way.
Humanitarian outrage
International organizations who viewed Losci's footage reacted with revulsion.
"We cannot let the perpetrators of such hideous crime go unpunished," said Daan Everts of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. "This should trigger even more intensive efforts to put an end to the conflict."
"This is repetition of what happened in Bosnia, and we did not stop it, and it continues, so as much as we as a humanitarian agency have to be neutral, it doesn't mean we need to be naive and stupid," said Barshad Rastegar of the U.S.-based agency Relief International.
"We are there to protect and preserve human life, and each one of these individuals is a family, is a universe," he said. "These are innocent human beings. I do not find it difficult to call for action."
Correspondent Amanda Kibel contributed to this report.
CNN's Andrea Koppel provides details on the State Department's report WARNING: Contains images that some may find disturbing
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BELGRADE - Tanjug General Director and Editor-in-Chief Dusan Djordjevic and CNN representative for Yugoslavia Brent Sadler signed Wednesday a contract on the use of the Yugoslav national news agency news service by CNN.
This is Tanjug's first contract on providing its news service to US users and a first contract of a Yugoslav news agency with CNN.
The contract will enable the US public to get first-hand information on the developments in Yugoslavia, Djordjevic said.
The one-year contract is valid as of today, Wednesday.
Serbian Renewal Movement (May 19th)
SPO: REACTION
The Serbian Renewal Movement condemns today's attack on the Democratic Party headquarters in Belgrade and demands that they stop.
At the same time, the SPO expects from the leading people in the DP to publicly and clearly condemn their leader who, in the most difficult times for the Serbian people and our homeland, has fled Serbia.
BELGRADE - Yugoslav Army statement after demonstrations in Krusevac:
"Citizens of Krusevac: Yesterday, 17th May, and today, 18th May, a gathering of citizens was organized in Krusevac to demand that the members of the war units be allowed to return home.
"The organized gathering turned into demonstrations of a destructive nature.
"The parents' most noble feelings were misused by the organisers, who have, for the most part, been identified.
"The procedure envisaged by the Law on the State of War has been initiated against the organizers and initiators of these demonstrations.
"The war has been imposed on the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
So far, the aggressor has conducted over 20,000 sorties and dropped more explosives than during the whole of World War II.
In spite of this, the enemy has not achieved its goals.
"The heroic behaviour of the people and their army in the defence of the homeland and everything we hold sacred has forced the enemy to begin considering now whether to officially declare war on the FRY or turn to a diplomatic-political path.
"A number of peace initiatives are under way, and our unity and successful defence, which we must preserve at all costs, are sure guarantees that we will become equal partners in talks and win a just peace.
"Seeing that the mightiest war machinery in the world and the criminal and bestial bombing are not enough to break the resistance of our defence, the enemy is now trying to find among us the supporters of capitulation and traitors.
"The destructive demonstrations in Krusevac on 17 and 18th May were intended to break our defence capabilities.
"The decision by the Supreme Command on the reduction of the number of the Yugoslav Army members in Kosovo has been carried out in accordance to plan and in view of the situation.
"In the conditions of continuous bombing, the plans for the withdrawal have to be subordinate primarily to the protection of the lives of our fighters.
"The demands that the issues of defence be resolved in different ways, through demonstrations, destruction and wilfulness and instructions from the side, represent direct collaboration with the enemy and are intended to weaken our defence abilities.
"In a state of war, gathering is allowed only with the permission of the relevant authorities.
Any other behaviour, such as encouraging and inciting unrest and destruction and spreading disinformation and rumours, is punishable in accordance with the Law on War Conditions.
"The Yugoslav Army units will continue to provide all necessary information, and the bodies of authority and local self-government will continue to provide all assistance to the families of the fighters.
"No issue will be resolved in the streets, and the undermining of the country's defence powers will not be allowed .
We have to preserve the unity of our defence at all costs.
ZAGREB - According to reliable information, Croatia has joined in the armed aggression on Yugoslavia, this time through yet another media trick which should be carried out in Albania using Croatian warplanes and directed by NATO.
Croatia has ceded three fighter planes, MIG 21s, to NATO forces in Albania, which should be presented as Yugoslav Army fighter planes.
Yugoslav Army insignia are currently being placed on these Croatian planes, while bodies of killed terrorists of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army are being collected from along the border belt with Yugoslavia.
These bodies should be strewn around an Albanian airport, according to the media scenario, to give legitimacy to the entire story.
This time, again, the chief director of the show is CNN correspondent Christian Amanpur. Pictures should cast blame on the Yugoslav side for allegedly infiltrating Albanian territory and on Yugoslav Army fighter planes for attacking alleged refugees.
Meanwhile, U.S. pilots are in training on Croatia to learn to fly Jastreb, Orao and Super Galeb planes, aircraft used by the Yugoslav armed forces.
Podgorica, May 12th (Montena Fax) - Members of MP attempted yesterday, unsucessfuly, to deliver subpoenas to several reporters of independent media. They were looking for Beba Marusic from weekly "Monitor" and Nebojsa Redzic from radio "Free Montenegro". Both of them were not there and their colleagues refused to take subpoenas.
"Vijesti":
Podgorica, May 12th (Montena Fax) - Investigating Judge of Military Court, under the Command of the Second Army of VJ in Podgorica, issued a warrant for arrest and criminal investigation against professor Miodrag Perovic, one of the founders of independent weekly "Monitor" and radio "Antena M". Perovic is accused of criminal act of damaging reputation of FRY and obstructing fight against the enemy. Professor Perovic has left Montenegro to avoid arrest.
BELGRADE - Secretary of Internal Affairs in Pristina announced on Friday that the body of Fehmi Agani, colleague of the leader of Democratic Alliance of Kosovo Ibrahim Rugova, has been found near Lipljane.
BELGRADE - TV Serbia broadcasted commentary on Thursday in the prime time news edition in which accused presidents of Democratic and Socialdemocratic Party, Zoran Djindjic and Vuk Obradovic for treason. "These so called "locators", seeing that the war is coming to an end, recommend themselves to the West and to our people for some future times" - excerpt from commentary.
Editor's note: Some people argued that bombing of Serb state TV is similar to the bombing of NBC or CNN. Try to find any similar lynch calls to the one above broadcasted on those stations and then say that Serb state TV is the same as TV stations in democratic countries. After similar commentary published in government daily paper "Ekspres Politika", editor-in-chief and owner of independent daily paper "Dnevni Telegraf", Slavko Curuvija was murdered several days later. Killer was never found although we all know who ordered his execution. Vladislav Jovanovic, chief of FRY's UN Mission, stated in Larry King Live that executions are "normal" in FRY and mentioned that the chief of Serbian police was also executed. Milosevic emissary openly admits that Serbia is the land of crime.
Baghdad - Iraqi president Saddam Hussein expressed his support today, because of the Yugoslav Day of the Statehood , to the president of FRY Slobodan Milosevic and Yugoslav people in their confrontation with NATO. "We express solidarity with Yugoslav people and it's leadership in their confrontation with aggression and foreign threats to their country" - excerpt from the Saddam's letter sent to Milosevic. Reuters and INA contributed to this report.
BK TV also mentioned letters of support to Milosevic sent from North Korea, Vietnam and Libya.
Leader of Libyan Revolution, colonel Moammar El Gadhafi had a meeting with personal emissary of the president of FRY, vicepresident of Federal Government Zoran Lilic in Tripoli. They discussed almost 3 hours about NATO aggression on Yugoslavia and it's consequences on the stability of Balkan and the future of the world.
Association of Independent Electronic Media has protested against one year sentence to the editor of TV "Soko", Nebojsa Ristic. He was convicted on April 23rd because he violated section of penal code "spreading false news". Ristic hanged poster "Free Media in Serbia" with insignia of Radio B92 in public place.
NO MORE LIES!
March 9th 1991 - April 23rd 1999
It took 8 years to finally destroy TV Bastille. This is a tribute to all those who attended protest in 1991. The reason we were not successful then was Vuk Draskovic himself. This is official statement of Vuk Draskovic published on his party web site:
REASON MUST STOP INSANITY
To our state's preparedness to accept the agreement solution to the Kosovo problems in a peaceful way, and not with bombs and killing, and within the framework of Russia's initiative and with the broadest engagement of the United Nations, NATO aggressor replied by bombing RTS and with new crimes.
The bombs which were dropped on RTS did not hit only the biggest information house in Serbia, but they hit one of the centres of modern Serbian culture, art, science and education.
In Aberdareva and Takovska streets, where NATO missiles poured down, taking many human lives, hundreds of drama programmes and films and thousands and thousands of hours of science, education, entertainment and sports programmes, which are a part of the national heritage, had been produced.
In April of 1941 Hitler's general Lehr set the Serbian National Library as a war target, and in April 1999 American general Clarke set as his target the Serbian television, Serbian bridges, factories, schools, refugee convoys and camps.
Within only one month, NATO has inflicted more injuries on Serbia and the Serbs than the Nazi occupier did in four years.
It is high time the UN Security Council and the reason of the world stopped this systematic and criminal killing of our people and country.
The latest news is that Vuk Draskovic ordered Dragan Kojadinovic, editor-in-chief of Studio B, to offer his TV studio to RTS in order to broadcast government news. This makes Studio B a legitimate target.
BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (CNN) -- Hours after a Russian special envoy announced that Yugoslavia had agreed to allow an unarmed, U.N.-led "international presence" in Kosovo, explosions thundered through Belgrade early Friday and state-run Serbian television went off the air.
CNN Correspondent Brent Sadler, reporting from the Yugoslav capital, described the airstrikes as one of the most intense attacks since Operation Allied Force began. He said that the building housing Serbian television had been struck and was on fire. The network's signal, monitored at CNN headquarters in Atlanta, turned to snow.
Yugoslav officials told CNN there were people inside the building when it was hit. Residents in the area said bodies were being taken out of the building.
Officials also said a main police station was attacked and "badly damaged" as a result of ongoing NATO attacks.
NATO had warned that Serbian television would be targeted, accusing it of spreading misinformation and government propaganda.
Watch Serbian TV go off the air during the attack, described by CNN's Brent Sadler
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County court in Sremska Mitrovica
Svetlana Djuricic, Judge of the County Court in Sremska Mitrovica, sentenced Zvonko Zivanovic from Lacarak at Sremska Mitrovica to five months in prison because he insulted and disrespected Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the President of FRY.
Zivanovic was trialed by shortened procedure due to the regulations imposed by the state of war. Zivanovic is held in prison without bail.
"Novosti" learns from reliable sources
According to the well informed sources from the White House, Albania has big problems with refugees from Kosmet (Kosovo & Metohija) and their discontent over living conditions and present situation. Confronted with diseases and death of older and exhausted, members of Western Alliance, according to these sources, are especially concerned about growing influence of Ibrahim Rugova on refugees, manifested in their desire to go back to their homes.
According to the White House sources, convoy of Albanian refugees who decided to return to their homes was intentionally bombed because of two reasons:
- to let everyone know that there will be nothing of their return because this is not consistent with established strategy of NATO, and
- that for this committed crime, with adequate support of media propaganda, blame Serb military and police forces.
Sources further quote William Cohen, U.S. minister of defense, that he requested from Wesley Clark, NATO commander for Europe, to personally choose the pilot who will execute this order and accomplish the mission. Cohen said that there was a big mistake because chosen pilot that was supposed to attack convoy of Albanian refugees didn't accomplish this unnoticed from other pilots. The name of this pilot is kept in secret.
It is mentioned that this is the Dutch pilot, trained in military bases in USA.
The same source told us that after this accomplished massacre of Albanian refugees, American president Bill Clinton, asked for immediate resignation of Wesley Clark, which was rejected because of political reasons.
After all that has happened, NATO Command is continuing with accomplishment of their goals and tasks.
BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (AP) -- The Yugoslav federal parliament voted Monday to join an alliance with Russia and Belarus, an action aimed at getting military help from Russia and Belarus to stop NATO strikes.
Serbian Premier Mirko Marjanovic said after the parliament vote that it was "normal" for Yugoslavia to join the union with its historic Christian Orthodox allies.
"It is yet another way to resist the NATO aggression," Marjanovic said.
NATO's airstrikes, which started March 24, severely crippled Yugoslavia's industrial infrastructure and destroyed numerous military targets.
The Russia-Belarus union remains largely an agreement on paper only; it has not produced any visible benefits to either nation.
Throughout its troubled history, Yugoslavia always has been against any domination from either the West or the East and has jealously defended its sovereignty. This is the first time since it was founded in 1918 that it is trying to join an alliance with foreign nations.
Acting on an initiative originating from the Serbian ultranationalist Radical Party, the chairmen of both chambers of the Yugoslav assembly called the session following a visit here last week by Russian state Duma chairman Gennady Seleznov.
At the lower house, out of 115 deputies present, 110 supported the motion, while five abstained. At the upper house, of the 27 delegates present, 26 were in favor and one abstained.
The idea of a union between Russia, Belarus and Yugoslavia is particularly popular among Russian and Yugoslav communists who regret the breakup of the Soviet Union.
Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said Monday that Moscow "positively regards the idea of Yugoslavia's membership" in the union.
It was not yet clear what formal steps need to be taken for Yugoslavia to become a full-fledged member. It took months of wrangling before Russia and Belarus were able to work out all the details of their union treaty.
In a statement, the Yugoslav parliament called the proposal "a historic step of great importance to Yugoslavia's people."
The session opened with a minute of silence for the victims of "NATO's aggression." Yugoslav Premier Momir Bulatovic later addressed both chambers of the assembly.
He proposed that parliament accept the decision to join because it "creates a condition for the peoples of Russia, Belarus and Yugoslavia to join forces and protect their vital state and national interests."
Prior to the session, supporters of the Radical Party marched through downtown Belgrade to the federal assembly, waving party flags and cheering in support of the country joining the Russian-Belarus federation.
The killing took place in the heart of Belgrade, a few hundred yards from the Yugoslav parliament building. Curuvija's girlfriend, Branka Prpa, said she and Curuvija were returning home from a walk at 4:40 p.m. when they were accosted by two young men dressed in black with black face masks in a narrow tunnel leading to their apartment building.
"They were obviously professionals," she told journalists and friends who gathered at her apartment on Belgrade's Lola Ribar Street. "One of the men hit me across the back of the head with his pistol and pushed me aside. They then shot Slavko several times in the head." As she spoke, blood seeped through her blond hair from the wound at the back of her head.
Prpa interrupted her description of the slaying with sobs, murmurs of "Oh my God" and bewildered speculation over the motives of the killers. Curuvija "was not that dangerous to the state," she declared. "He was a man who just did his work and nothing else."
Plainclothes policemen cordoned off the crime scene as they cleared the pool of blood at the entrance to the building, but then they permitted Curuvija's friends and colleagues up to the apartment.
Six days ago, a commentary in the pro-government Belgrade newspaper Politika Express accused Curuvija of urging NATO to bomb Yugoslavia and warned that "people like him" would neither be "forgiven nor forgotten."
Whole article is available here:
We have just found this news on BBC's web site: Slavko Curuvija, the owner and editor-in-chief of Dnevni Telegraf, was shot dead in the street. This is not confirmed and we will investigate further. You can read the whole story:
Internet web site B92 as well as whole Opennet.org are currently controlled by Milosevic's government. This is the message some people recently received:
Your mail to an opennet.org or b92.net email address can not be delivered at this time. After a takeover of the B92 premises in Belgrade, the Serbian authorities have shut down the machines serving these domains.
Please check the pages of the Amsterdam based 'Help B92' support campaign at http://helpb92.xs4all.nl for news. We advise that you don't send anything to any opennet.org or b92.net address without checking the current status of the domains.
Help B92 Amsterdam
Albanians to Albania, Serbs to Sarajevo and Milosevic support rallies:
BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (CNN) -- NATO missiles slammed into downtown Belgrade early Saturday, transforming two government buildings into towers of bright orange flames.
The Yugoslavian and Serbian ministries of internal affairs were hit, Yugoslav officials said. Serbian television showed video of the burning buildings, with sheets of fire pouring out their blackened windows.
Fire crews rushed to the scene in a seemingly futile effort to control the raging blaze while police cordoned off the area.
The Pentagon confirmed that U.S. ships in the Adriatic Sea fired at least seven cruise missiles at targets in the Yugoslav capital.
The missiles are striking "at the core of the regime's ability to conduct the campaign against the Kosovar Albanians," said Pentagon spokesman Ken Bacon. He would not elaborate on specific targets.
The attack marked the first time NATO has hit the heart of Belgrade since the airstrikes began March 24. A senior U.S. administration official told CNN that better weather over Yugoslavia allowed a "deeper target list" and that NATO was going after "high-value" targets it had wanted to hit for several days.
"We have been frustrated by our inability to ratchet it up and are getting at least a little break today," the official said.
NATO has directed more force in recent days at Yugoslav army supply lines, and those attacks are damaging soldiers' morale, the Pentagon said earlier Friday.
"The forces are clearly more wary of being hit. They've had to disperse more and are having a harder time operating in large, coherent units," Bacon said.
When asked how the United States knew about morale in the Yugoslav army, Bacon said the Pentagon had a wide array of sources.
NATO may get some extra firepower. The USS Theodore Roosevelt is due to enter the Mediterranean early Saturday. Bacon said he would not be surprised if that ship was ordered into the Adriatic for use in Operation Allied Force.
That move would give NATO 40 to 50 extra combat planes to fly more sorties over Yugoslavia.
The B-1 bomber flew its first mission Thursday night, attacking some Yugoslav army staging areas in Kosovo. Bacon said the objective was to weaken the soldiers' ability to carry out oppression in Kosovo.
NATO spokesmen Jamie Shea and British Air Commodore David Wilby said Friday the sustained NATO airstrikes were creating fuel shortages for the Yugoslav army and Serb police units and were somewhat slowing the military crackdown in Kosovo.
NATO: Third of Kosovar Albanians on the run
NATO said Friday the number of ethnic Albanians forced by Serbia to flee their homes in Kosovo had reached 634,000, or about one-third of the pre-conflict population.
NATO expressed concern about the continued Kosovo refugee crisis, which it said was caused by a large-scale ethnic cleansing campaign.
The Yugoslav government has denied such allegations, saying the ethnic Albanian refugees are fleeing the fighting between government troops and the Kosovo Liberation Army.
Shea said at Friday's news conference at NATO headquarters that Yugoslav troops had forced 30,000 people out of the Kosovo capital in the past 24 hours.
He said Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic was deliberately pushing the refugees out into neighboring countries in order to "destabilize the region."
Shea said NATO would continue to provide tents, communications gear and other aid to go with supplies from the European Union and the U.N. refugee agency.
'Where are the men?'
"Serb paramilitaries, locally raised militias, continue to terrorize ethnic Albanians and take advantage of the situations to loot" Kosovo villages, Wilby told the news media.
He showed NATO intelligence footage that he said showed clear proof of the Serbs' deliberate and systematic destruction of ethnic Albanian housing and other property in Kosovo.
NATO said it had reports from various sources saying that families were being separated, and men and boys were led away.
"What has happened to the men?" Shea asked at the news conference. "Will the authorities in Belgrade please tell us: where are all of the Kosovar Albanian men between the ages of 16 and 60?"
Bombings disrupt fuel supplies
Wilby said that more than a week of NATO airstrikes had forced the Yugoslav army to hide its tanks or take up positions in deserted villages and towns.
"This cat-and-mouse activity is causing them to use up critical fuel supplies," Wilby said. A field brigade was immobilized Thursday by a lack of fuel, he said.
NATO bombings against key army supply routes, support facilities and field forces will continue unabated, he said.
Among the targets hit in the recent NATO attack were a bridge in Novi Sad and field force targets in the Pagarusa Valley, where Serbs were said to have shelled ethnic Albanians.
Serbia airs NATO damage footage
Serbian state-controlled TV reported Friday that NATO missiles hit an army barracks in the town of Vranje in southeastern Serbia.
The Belgrade-based Tanjug news agency said NATO jets struck near the western Kosovo town of Klina, 50 kilometers (30 miles) west of Pristina.
It was the first reported attack near Klina, located along a major road junction used by Serbian forces.
Also, a NATO jet fired missiles Friday at the television transmitter on Mount Cvilen above the southern city of Prizren but missed, the agency said.
Yugoslav coup plans for Montenegro
In London, British officials charged that Milosevic was plotting a coup to replace Milo Djukanovic, president of the Yugoslav province of Montenegro.
"Mr. Milosevic wants to replace President Djukanovic by a man of his own choosing. Although I cannot give you the details today, I can say that I have evidence to show that he's preparing a coup against Montenegro," said Defense Ministry spokesman Edgar Buckley.
"As a first step, he has already replaced the army commander, General Martinovic, by a new general who can be relied upon to follow his orders," Buckley said.
The Pentagon said that should Yugoslav forces move into Montenegro they would face intensified attacks from NATO.
Russian navy vessel leaves port
In Sevastopol, on the Black Sea, the Russian reconnaissance ship Linman left its dock early Friday for the Mediterranean. Its mission, according to the Russian defense minister, is not to fight, but to provide intelligence.
"The purpose is to collect more detailed information. We should have such information in the interests of Russian security," said Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev.
But military analysts say that intelligence, if shared with the Serbs, could endanger NATO ships.
The defense minister said as many as six more vessels, including warships, could be sent to the region during the next few days, depending on how events develop.
There are reports Yugoslavia will hand over the remains of the downed American F-117 to the Russians.
The Pentagon said that move would not be surprising. Spokesman Bacon also noted the plane's stealth technology is more than 20 years old and is "quite difficult to duplicate."
BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (CNN) -- Yugoslav authorities took over the country's leading independent radio station Friday, raising fears of a crackdown on democratic institutions during NATO airstrikes.
Sasa Mirkovic, director of radio station B92, said he showed up for work Friday only to be told by police and commercial court officials that he was being replaced.
Mirkovic said his replacement will be Aleksandar Nikacevic, a government loyalist and a member of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's Socialist Party. There was no immediate comment from authorities.
The station's transmitter was disabled last week, but it has continued to broadcast via satellite and the Web (http://www.b92.net/). Mirkovic and his colleagues have vowed to get B92 back on the air soon.
"Government officials have shut down radio B92 -- silencing the last independent voice in Serbia," the station told visitors to its Web site Friday.
"Struggle continues. We shall never surrender," the station's announcement concludes.
While he doesn't blame NATO for the move, Mirkovic said the past 10 days of allied bombardment are complicating an already complicated situation within Serbia, the dominant republic in the Yugoslav federation.
"These NATO airstrikes are putting democratic forces in our society and independent media in a very difficult position," he said. "We are very doubtful that bombs could solve any type of political crisis that we are now carrying here in Serbia."
B92 is the most influential of a group of 35 independent radio and 18 television stations in Yugoslavia. Veran Matic, the station's editor-in-chief, said three other independent broadcasters had been closed down, while others have stuck to music to avoid the government's scrutiny.
"Democracy is one of the victims of bombardment, and what has happened to B92 is just another proof of that," he said.
