Grenades, gunfire and four-letter headlines herald painful birth of brand new country

HAND grenades were thrown at United Nations and European Union offices in a Serb enclave yesterday after Kosovo's parliament declared the province was an "independent, democratic and sovereign state".

In the first signs that the controversial announcement would lead to serious trouble, the EU was forced to abandon its office in the city of Mitrovica after two hand grenades were thrown. A grenade also exploded at the UN mission there.

In the Serbian capital Belgrade, a crowd of up to 2,000 angry Serbs stoned the US embassy to protest at the United States' support for the declaration, breaking a number of windows.

Demonstrators chanting patriotic songs appeared to be approaching the embassy easily through nearby side streets despite the presence of some 500 police in full riot gear.

The grenade which exploded at the UN mission caused no significant damage, but EU officials evacuated their building, which houses the team preparing a mission to supervise Kosovo's independence.

"Officials abandoned the (EU) building. Security guards said two hand grenades had been thrown. One had exploded," a source said.

The violent response to the declaration contrasted with scenes of wild celebration in Kosovo's capital Pristina.

Tens of thousands of Kosovo Albanians poured on to the freezing streets after the prime minister, Hacim Thaci, and the president, Fatmir Sejdiu, signed the independence declaration.

"Kosovo is a republic – an independent, democratic and sovereign state," the Kosovo parliament's speaker, Jakup Krasniqi, said as the chamber burst into applause.

On the jam-packed streets of Pristina, the reaction to the long-awaited declaration was instantaneous. Amid a fanfare of thousands of blaring horns from cars festooned with Albanian, British, American and Nato flags, came the crackling and judder of massive celebratory automatic weapons fire from all over Pristina.

Outside Pristina's central Grand Hotel, a whooping, hysterically happy crowd had gathered and the logo printed on one man's baseball jacket said it all. "Bye Bye Serbia" read the defiant white letters, above a picture of a hand showing the universally recognised extended middle finger.

"This is unreal, I have never seen so many people, I feel so special," said Krenare Maloku, a 20-year-old project manager and economics student. "Ever since I can remember, Albanians were fighting for independence. But shortly after independence here, we will wake up and see we have the same problems."

Ymer Govori, 36, carrying his daughter on his shoulders, said: "I feel stronger. I have my own state and my own postcode, and it won't say Serbia any longer."

The front page of Express, Kosovo's Albanian quality daily, carried photos of Marshal Tito of Yugoslavia, Slobodan Milosevic and Serbia's Prince Lazar with the unequivocal banner headline: "F*** YOU."

The United States and Britain and other EU countries are expected to support the declaration. "The US will continue to work with our allies to do the very best we can to make sure there's no violence," the president, George Bush, said yesterday while on a visit to Tanzania.

The Serbian prime minister, Vojislav Kostunica, condemned Kosovo as "a false state" in a televised address to the nation yesterday, minutes after it declared independence. He said Kosovo was propped up unlawfully by the US which was "ready to violate the international order for its own military interests".

Russia called the independence declaration "an illegitimate act" and called for an emergency session of the UN security Council, saying it was supporting Serbia's pledge to keep its borders intact.

The EU called for calm and non-violence following the declaration, while Nato's 17,000-strong K-For peacekeeping contingent, deployed across the province, was poised to respond to what their French commander, Lieutenant General Xavier de Marnhac called "any acts of provocation".

Some 600 British troops from the 1st Battalion, The Welsh Guards, are on standby to move to Kosovo at short notice should ethnic violence or riots break out in the province in the coming days.

BLOODY ENMITY DATES BACK MORE THAN 600 YEARS

MENTION the magical date of 1389 anywhere in the Balkans and everybody knows to what you are referring: the year of the battle of Kosovo Polje in central Kosovo, where the Serb Orthodox armies were defeated by the Ottomans, leading to 500 years of dominance by them in the region.

When Slobodan Milosevic stood at the site of the battle in 1989 and told one million Serbs he would return "their" lands to them, the stage was set for confrontation between Kosovo's Albanians and Serbs.

The first pro-independence demonstrations by ethnic Albanians in Kosovo were in 1968, and in 1991 Kosovo separatists proclaimed the province a republic as the wars in Yugoslavia broke out.

Nato allies first authorised airstrikes against Serb military targets in October 1998.

Amid continuing atrocities, such as the killing of 45 ethnic Albanians in the village of Racak, and after Belgrade rejected an internationally brokered peace deal, Nato launched 78 days of airstrikes against Yugoslavia.

By 10 June, 1999, Milosevic agreed to withdraw his troops from Kosovo.

Nato-led peacekeepers were deployed in Kosovo and Albanian refugees streamed back while Serbs fled the province.