KOSOVSKA MITROVICA, Kosovo - Violent protests rocked Serb-dominated northern Kosovo yesterday as crowds chanting "Kosovo is ours!" hurled stones, bottles, and firecrackers at UN police guarding a bridge that divides Serbs from ethnic Albanians.
The scenes evoked memories of the carnage unleashed by former Serb autocrat Slobodan Milosevic the last time Kosovo tried to break away from Serbia, which considers the territory its ancestral homeland.
There were disturbing signs that the riots in Belgrade, Serbia, and in the northern Kosovo town of Mitrovica have the blessing of nationalists in the Serbian government, which hopes to somehow undo the loss of the beloved province.
Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica's authorities have repeatedly vowed to reclaim the land, despite US and other Western recognition of Kosovo's statehood. Some hard-line government ministers have praised the violent protests as "legitimate" and in line with government policies of retaining control over Serb-populated areas.
The Serbian president, Boris Tadic, called an emergency meeting of the national security council and said the rioting that engulfed the capital must "never happen again."
"I most sharply condemn the violence, looting and arson," Tadic said in a statement. "There is no excuse for the violence. Nobody can justify what happened yesterday."
Kosovo's ethnic Albanian leaders declared independence from Serbia last Sunday. The province, which is 90 percent ethnic Albanian, has not been under Serbia's control since 1999, when NATO launched airstrikes to halt a Serbian crackdown on ethnic Albanian separatists. A UN mission has governed Kosovo since.
The US ambassador to Serbia demanded that authorities do more to guarantee the safety of foreign diplomatic missions after nationalists in Belgrade set fire to the US Embassy in riots Thursday that left one dead and more than 150 injured.
The State Department ordered nonessential diplomats and the families of all American personnel at the embassy to leave Serbia after the attack.
In his first postindependence interview, Kosovo's prime minister said the violence is reminiscent of the Milosevic era.
"The pictures of yesterday in Belgrade were pictures of Milosevic's time," said Hasim Thaci, a former guerrilla leader of the disbanded Kosovo Liberation Army, said at his office in Pristina, the capital. "What we saw were terrible things."
He said the violence recalled Milosevic's bloody 1998-99 crackdown on ethnic Albanian separatists in Kosovo, which was halted only by NATO airstrikes on Serbia.
In Kosovska Mitrovica, about 5,000 Serbs rallied in the tense town, waving Serbian flags and chanting "Kosovo is ours!" in a fifth day of protests since the independence declaration. Protesters lobbed firecrackers in a skirmish with police.
The clashes took place on the Kosovska Mitrovica bridge over the Ibar River - dividing Kosovo Serbs from ethnic Albanians - long a flashpoint of tensions in Kosovo's restive north.
"Kosovo is Serbia, and we will never surrender, despite blackmail by the European Union," Serbian official Dragan Deletic told the crowd, which responded by chanting: "Kosovo is Serbia."
He was referring to the several EU countries, including Britain, Germany, France, and Italy, that have recognized Kosovo's declaration of independence.
Tensions were higher than usual yesterday after French NATO peacekeepers on Kosovo's border refused to allow in several busloads of Serbs who wanted to join the rally. Some Serbs apparently managed to evade the blockade, leading the clashes at the bridge.
Kosovo Serbs have been venting their anger over Kosovo's statehood by destroying UN and NATO property, setting off hand grenades, and staging noisy rallies. Some Serbs seeing the violence can't help thinking the spasm of outrage will set back their cause.
Pro-Western politicians in Serbia accused hard-line nationalists in the Kostunica's government of inciting the violence.
Parties of Tadic and Kostunica are united in a coalition government that has ruled Serbia since mid-2007. But the two differ sharply on Kosovo, with Tadic saying Belgrade must press on with efforts to join the EU regardless of Kosovo, and Kostunica seeking to drop the bid because most EU countries plan to recognize the province's independence.
Kostunica appealed for an end to the violence. "This directly damages our . . . national interests. All those who support the fake state of Kosovo are rejoicing at the sight of violence in Belgrade," he said.
He made no mention of the damaged embassies. In addition to the US and Croatian embassies, the missions of Turkey, Bosnia, Belgium, and Canada were targeted.
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