War in the Balkans: Diplomatic Moves - Russia struggles to put life into peace efforts

A SCEPTICAL West was waiting for another peace offer from President Slobodan Milosevic last night as Russia struggled to breathe life into diplomatic efforts to find a formula to halt the 16-day-old Kosovo war.

After a meeting on Wednesday of the six-nation Contact Group of leading powers, the same senior officials gather again today in Dresden, Germany - this time as representatives of the G8 industrial powers, which also include Japan and Canada. But with the bombardment of Serb targets continuing unabated, there is scant prospect of enough common ground to justify the foreign ministers' meeting demanded by the Russian President, Boris Yeltsin, still less a full-scale summit canvassed by Moscow.

Speaking after talks with the Norwegian Foreign Minister, Knut Vollebaek - the most senior official from a Nato country to travel to Russia since the bombing began on 23 March - the Russian Foreign Minister, Igor Ivanov, claimed Russia was making some headway in its efforts to promote a settlement.

The problem is that while the alliance accepts that Russia, Serbia's traditional friend and lone Contact-Group member to oppose the air strikes, is the one country with a chance of influencing President Milosevic, it is giving Moscow absolutely no room to manoeuvre.

Technically, the basis for a settlement is still the failed Rambouillet package signed three weeks ago by the Kosovo Albanians but rejected out of hand by Belgrade. In practice, the terms have been stiffened, into what might be called "Rambouillet plus".

This comprises not only a total ceasefire followed by deployment of an international peacekeeping force and autonomy for the province, but the return home of all refugees and the withdrawal of Yugoslav army, police and other security forces from Kosovo in their entirety - as opposed to the original deal allowing Mr Milosevic to deploy 1,500 troops to guard Kosovo's international borders, and the 40,000-plus in and around the province now. But the longer the fighting continues, the less likely are the Kosovo Albanians to be satisfied by even these terms.

There is every sign it will continue. Nato diplomats dismissed as "a ploy" last night a statement by the Serb media that the Yugoslav offensive against Albanian "terrorists" in Kosovo had ended, and that "peace" had been restored to the province. According to the diplomats, the crackdown in the province continued unchecked, despite Tuesday's announcement of a unilateral ceasefire over the Orthodox Easter. Nato is equally sceptical of claims by Russia's parliament speaker, Gennady Seleznev, yesterday that President Milosevic and the moderate Kosovo Albanian leader, Ibrahim Rugova, had agreed to draft a plan for an interim government in Kosovo.

Despite Serb television pictures showing the two men shaking hands, Nato and Albanian sources say Mr Rugova is being held under house arrest in the Kosovo capital, Pristina.

Even so, Western countries are already doing "a lot of thinking" about the post-war political arrangements for Kosovo, and the reconstruction of the Balkans. France is to propose a debt-cancellation and aid package for Albania and Macedonia at this month's International Monetary Fund meetings in Washington.

r President Yeltsin had medical tests yesterday and then returned to one of his country residences, the Kremlin press service said. Mr Yeltsin, 68 and often sick in recent years, stopped at the Central Clinical Hospital for the scheduled tests on his way home from the Kremlin.