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Europe
Jordan U.N. Police Officers Lose Immunity
2004-04-19
Four U.N. police officers from Jordan were stripped of their diplomatic immunity Monday to be questioned in a fellow Jordanian's killing of two American guards in Kosovo. It wasn't clear why Sgt. Maj. Ahmed Mustafa Ibrahim Ali opened fire on a convoy of corrections officers on Saturday. He and the two female American guards were killed in the shootout that followed, and 11 people were wounded. Ali was a member of a highly trained unit in Jordan and had been decorated for warding off an attack on the Israeli Embassy in Amman, a Jordanian official said. The four other Jordanian police officers at the prison in the town of Kosovska Mitrovica were detained. Authorities lifted their diplomatic immunity, opening the way for them to be interrogated, officials said. A delegation of Jordanian police officials arrived Monday in Kosovo to assist with the investigation, which is led by an international prosecutor, officials said.

Eight of the 10 Americans were moved to a U.S. military base in Kosovo for treatment, a U.S. military spokesman said Monday. The other two were treated and released, and an Austrian also wounded was flown home Sunday for treatment. One American officer remained in critical condition following brain surgery in neighboring Macedonia, U.S. peacekeeping spokesman Staff Sgt. Michael Houk said. The attack shook the United Nations mission in Kosovo, already in turmoil following violent ethnic clashes last month between ethnic Albanians and Serbs that killed 19 and wounded more than 900 in Kosovska Mitrovica. "The shooting struck a huge blow at the very idea of peacekeeping," said Alex Anderson, the Kosovo project director of the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based organization that monitors the Balkans.
That's today's statement of the obvious...
An American police officer serving with the U.N. mission in Kosovo told The Associated Press that the shooting was "clearly an attack against Americans." Officials denied rumors that a quarrel about the war in Iraq had sparked the gunbattle. "As far as we know, there was no communication between the officer who fired and the group of victims," said Neeraj Singh, a U.N. spokesman.
So it was an ambush...
The officers were part of the U.N. mission that has administered Kosovo and provided security since June 1999, when Belgrade's authority over the province was removed following a NATO air war that stopped a Serb crackdown on independence-seeking ethnic Albanians. "This is a sad day for United Nations peacekeeping," said Stefan Feller, the head of the U.N. police in Kosovo. "At this stage there can be no conclusions on the reason for the shooting." The gunbattle began as three U.N. vehicles carrying 21 U.S. correctional officers, two Turkish officers and the Austrian were leaving the prison, which was guarded by five Jordanian special police unit officers, officials said. The correctional officers, who arrived in Kosovo just 10 days ago, had been training at the prison. Ali, 30, started firing at the convoy, Feller said, and the officers returned fire. The names of the dead have not been released pending family notification. Jordan's government expressed regret for the shootings, a statement carried by the official Jordanian Petra agency said.
Posted by:TS

#4  Yep guyz the Bush Administration has made us hated around the world

Ooooh, not Mikey Moore is all up in arms over the possibility of not being "liked". So what?

Whether we're liked or not doesn't mean diddly squat. As long as they're afraid of us, then that's what really matters.
Posted by: Bomb-a-rama   2004-04-19 11:37:47 PM  

#3  '...the Bush Administration has made us hated around the world."
NMM, no it hasn't.
We are loved around the world and besides, the whole concept of whether one country can feel "love" or any other emotion for another country is strange.
Is America dating? Looking for a bride?
I think not.
I've travelled around the world and we are loved, respected and admired everywhere.
The world expects us to be the Designated Driver of the planet and if we weren't they would have no hope for peace and justice.
President Bush has only heightened that good feeling by showing that once again, the USA will take an aggressive approach to evil and oppression!
Posted by: Jen   2004-04-19 11:30:12 PM  

#2  NMM as usual you mess up the facts.

The CLINTON administration got us involved in Kosov and Bosnia. And their handing it over to the UN is why so many years later the place is STILL a festering pesthole.
Posted by: OldSpook   2004-04-19 11:29:41 PM  

#1  Yep guyz the Bush Administration has made us hated around the world
Posted by: Not Mike Moore   2004-04-19 11:25:39 PM  

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