By Matt Robinson
ZUPCE, Kosovo (Reuters) - The United Nations persuadedSerbs on Sunday to remove two checkpoints they had set up 20kms (12 miles) inside the border of newly independent Kosovo.
For 24 hours, a blue portacabin topped with floodlightsstood at the side of the road running north to theKosovo-Serbia border, manned by Kosovo Serb police officerschecking vehicles.
The regional U.N. police chief negotiated with the localSerb authorities to have the cabin removed with the help ofDanish NATO peacekeepers, watched by a crowd of agitated Serbs.
One week after its Albanian majority declared independencefrom Serbia, there is a sense Kosovo is destined for partition,with the Serb-dominated north splitting away.
If partition came, the frontier between the two sides wouldrun where the portacabin was placed in Zupce.
"It's their imaginary red line," one Western official atthe scene commented. "They're playing games with us, sayingthis is where the border post should be."
Another blue box was placed on the eastern edge of theSerb-dominated strip of northern Kosovo and later removed.
Serbia has not said explicitly it wants to partitionKosovo, but in rejecting the province's secession it haspromised to strengthen its grip on Serb areas, notably thenorth where just under half of the 120,000 Serbs live withtheir backs to Serbia.
Kosovo's 90-percent Albanian majority rejects partition.
"Every part of Kosovo is under the full control of NATO,Kosovo police and the United Nations," Kosovo Prime MinisterHashim Thaci said on Sunday. "We are following closely theseevents and we are ready to face all challenges."
The European Union is taking over supervision of Kosovofrom the United Nations, which has run the territory since NATOwent to war in 1999 to save its Albanians from Serb ethniccleansing.
OCCUPATION
Serbs have rejected the mission as an "occupation".
The command structure in the Kosovo police service is nowsplit between Serb and Albanian, the Serbs coordinating theirwork through the U.N. police and local municipalities, notthrough Pristina.
What few ties there were between the north and Pristina arebreaking down. On Tuesday, mobs burned down the two borderposts in the north, forcing NATO to intervene.
Danish, French and American soldiers now secure Gates 1 and3-1. Kosovo police and customs officers have yet to return.
In Zupce, Serb cars without registration plates droveslowly up to the 'checkpoint' every 20 minutes, turning anddriving back below Serbian flags flying from trees. A policemanwaved through a Serb car, and stopped an Albanian to check hispapers.
Next to Zupce, in the Albanian village of Cabra, Danishsoldiers established a small base on Saturday, with armouredpersonnel carriers and tents.
If Kosovo was partitioned, Cabra would be cut off from therest of Kosovo.
(Additional reporting by Fatos Bytyci and Branislav Krstic;Editing by Douglas Hamilton and Robert Woodward)
