Hardened rubber bullets killed Kosovo protesters

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

Hardened rubber bullets killed Kosovo protesters
18 Apr 2007 13:09:19 GMT
Source: Reuters

By Matt Robinson

PRISTINA, Serbia, April 18 (Reuters) - Romanian U.N. police who shot
dead two ethnic Albanian protesters in Kosovo in February fired rubber
bullets with a use-by date of 1994, which had "probably hardened" with
age, police said on Wednesday.

A preliminary U.N. report released this week blamed a Romanian
contingent of the 1,800-strong U.N. police force for the deaths, caused
by head wounds from Italian-made RB1-rubber bullets fired at close
range.

The bullets, brought into Kosovo by the Romanian contingent, were
manufactured in 1991 and had a shelf life of three years, Commissioner
Richard Monk, U.N. police chief in the breakaway Serbian province, told
a news conference.

-snip-

The deaths shocked Kosovo and fuelled Western fears of widespread
unrest if the U.N. Security Council does not decide soon on a Western-
backed plan for independence.

-snip-

Read more: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L18289584.htm

[soothsayer]

1. whoops---hope our storm troopers, er, cops check their expy dates