PRISTINA (AP) - In a scathing report, a leading human rights organization blamed NATO and UN police yesterday for failing «catastrophically» to protect minorities in Kosovo during ethnic violence earlier this year. Among other charges, the New York-based Human Rights Watch accused NATO-led peacekeepers of locking their gates and standing by as Serb houses went up in flames just outside their bases during the mid-March riots that left 19 dead and 900 injured. «The NATO-led Kosovo Force and UN international police failed catastrophically to protect minorities during the widespread rioting,» said the 66-page report titled «Failure to Protect: Anti-Minority Violence in Kosovo, March 2004.» The report also accused the international community in Kosovo of being in «absolute denial about its own failures in Kosovo.»

KOSOVSKA MITROVICA (AP) - Hoping to revive efforts to return displaced Kosovo Serbs to their homes in the troubled province, a UN official and a local Serb leader said yesterday that they will try to help 300 Serb families return by the end of the year. If the return of the 300 families proves successful, a Kosovo Serb group and the United Nations would try to bring back some 1,200 families next year, said Dragisa Krstovic, who leads a Serb group called Povratak - Serbian for «return.» «This (return) will only take place where it is possible and secure enough for Serbs to come back,» Krstovic said.

A fire at an oil refinery in southern Turkey has been extinguished and the facility is out of danger, local officials said yesterday. The blaze at the ATAS refinery in the Mediterranean province of Mersin erupted on Sunday in a storage tank containing 9,000 tons of naphtha, an intermediate petroleum product between gasoline and benzine. Dozens of firefighters battled the flames for hours before bringing the fire under control. Officials decided on Sunday to let the naphtha inside the tank burn out. (AFP)

Sudan's foreign minister visited Turkey yesterday amid growing international pressure on his government to find a solution to the bloody conflict in the western region of Darfur. Mustafa Osman Ismail was scheduled to meet his Turkish counterpart, Abdullah Gul, and other officials. The two men were expected to discuss the dispute in Darfur and other bilateral and international issues, Turkish officials said. (AP)

A small private plane crashed yesterday in southern Turkey, killing the pilot and injuring three others, including two Austrian tourists, a news agency reported. The Cessna 172 airplane crashed in the southern Mugla province, home to a number of resorts, the Anatolia news agency reported, quoting Mehmet Yapici, a local official. The cause of the crash was not immediately clear. (AP)