Serbs Mount Huge Anti-Albanian Rally : Protest Alleged Persecution in Yugoslavia’s Kosovo Province

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia — Hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated here Saturday--in what was said to be the biggest rally in Yugoslavia since World War II--to protest the alleged persecution of Serbs by ethnic Albanians in restive Kosovo province. Albanians held a counter-demonstration in Pristina, capital of Kosovo.

Serbian Communist leader Slobodan Milosevic, speaking at the Belgrade rally, told supporters that no force will stop Serbia from regaining control of Kosovo, one of the Serbian republic’s two autonomous provinces.

Kosovo, in southern Yugoslavia, is made up almost entirely of Albanians, who are a minority in the country where Serbs make up the majority. Kosovo won greater autonomy under the 1974 constitution, but Serbs are pressing to regain control through constitutional reforms.

“This is not time for regret but for struggle. We shall stop terror in Kosovo and unite Serbia,” Milosevic told the Belgrade rally in a field along the Danube River. “This is a process which no force can stop. People could agree to live in poverty, but they will not agree to live without freedom.”

Although organizers said 1.5 million people attended the rally, independent witnesses put the figure at 500,000 to 800,000, which officials said was the largest such protest in Yugoslavia in the postwar era.

No incidents or arrests were reported, but tension was mounting in Pristina, located about 200 miles south of Belgrade, where about 30,000 people demonstrated in support of regional leaders forced to resign by the Serbian leadership.

Police Close Roads

Late Saturday, helmeted riot police closed all roads leading into Pristina to prevent more ethnic Albanians from joining at least 20,000 demonstrators still roaming the streets, a senior police officer said.

The move, later reported on Belgrade television, followed a warning carried by the state news agency Tanjug that “extraordinary measures could be taken” if the crowds in Pristina did not disperse.

The mostly young demonstrators ignored several warnings from local Communist leaders to leave. Tanjug and Kosovo’s Communist leadership said the situation worsened “from hour to hour.”

It was the third such demonstration in as many days in Pristina. About 20,000 ethnic Albanians took to the city’s streets Thursday following the resignations of two popular ethnic Albanian leaders--provincial Communist Party chief Kacusa Jasari and a deputy, Azem Vlasi. About 100,000 demonstrated on Friday.

Kosovo President Remzi Kolgeci told reporters Saturday that the provincial leadership is doing everything within its power to control the situation.

The Serbians blame Kosovo leaders for the growth of Albanian nationalism and alleged persecution of Kosovo’s Serbian minority. Kosovo is inhabited by 1.8 million ethnic Albanians and 200,000 Serbs.

Since bloody anti-Yugoslav riots by ethnic Albanian separatists in Kosovo in 1981, Kosovo has been the site of serious ethnic conflicts, and Milosevic has complained that Yugoslavia has been slow in solving the problem. Serbia is the largest of Yugoslavia’s six republics.

A power struggle among leaders in this diverse country, high inflation and labor unrest have aggravated ethnic strife this year in Yugoslavia among Serbs, Croats, Montenegrins, Albanians and other groups.