Envoy ends talks as airstrikes loom

With NATO poised to order airstrikes against Yugoslavia, a U.S. envoy ended two days of talks with President Slobodan Milosevic early today without an agreement to defuse the Kosovo crisis.

The envoy, Richard Holbrooke, gave no hint of an impending breakthrough, saying "nothing has changed." Calling the situation very serious, he said talks would continue later today to avert NATO airstrikes."On Monday, NATO will meet to authorize action," Holbrooke said. "We meanwhile will continue an intense effort to find a peaceful, acceptable" alternative to the use of force.

During seven hours of talks Saturday, Mi-lo-se-vic refused to meet a key demand - allowing an international monitoring force in Kosovo, where Serb forces have launched a crackdown against ethnic Albanians.

After the latest round of discussions, the Serb government, which Milosevic effectively controls, issued a statement saying all conditions necessary for a political settlement had been met and all U.N. demands fulfilled.

But Holbrooke said, "We certainly don't agree."

Showing Milosevic it means business if talks fail, Washington ordered the deployment of six B-52 bombers, one reconnaissance aircraft and 13 tankers to Britain in preparation for possible intervention.

Also stepping up the pressure, NATO Secretary-General Javier Solana said the 16 members all but erased their remaining differences on airstrikes at a meeting of alliance ambassadors Saturday.

"If Milosevic does not comply, I can tell you that NATO is ready to act," Solana told reporters in Brussels, Belgium.

The Serb statement Saturday offered no details, nor was it clear whether the government was simply reiterating previous claims that it had complied with a U.N. Security Council resolution calling on it to cease its offensive against Kosovo's ethnic Albanians and withdraw its forces.

On a day when the U.S. troubleshooter shuttled between Belgrade and Pristina, sources close to Milosevic said he had signaled his willingness to comply with six main demands in order to head off intervention.

Those measures include withdrawing more troops from Kosovo, allowing humanitarian aid to the refugees and opening up serious talks with the secessionists on the restoration of self-rule, which he abolished in 1989.

But the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Milosevic refused to budge on an additional demand to deploy an international monitoring force in the secessionist Serbian province. The force, aimed at seeing if he was living up to his commitments, would include some NATO troops.