(ROUGH CUT ONLY - NO REPORTER NARRATION)<br/> <br />Serbian authorities removed an Albanian war memorial in the southern town of Presevo early on Sunday (January 20).<br/> <br />More than two hundred Serbian police, backed by armoured personnel carriers, cordoned off the main square in Presevo, 350 kilometres south of Belgrade and used a front-end loader to move away the memorial with the names of 27 ethnic Albanian guerrillas who died in an insurgency there more than a decade ago.<br/> <br />There were no incidents or protests during the police action and local officials declined to comment.<br/> <br />The insurgents of the Liberation Army of Presevo, Medvedja and Bujanovac (UCPMB) rebelled in 2000, demanding unification of this predominantly ethnic-Albanian area with Kosovo.<br/> <br />The insurgency ended in May 2001 with a NATO-brokered peace deal which envisioned an amnesty and disarmament of the rebels.<br/> <br />Albanians, who account to about 70 percent of the population in the area, regard UCPMB fighters as heroes, while Serbian authorities see them as terrorists.<br/> <br />Tensions in the Presevo Valley could complicate European Union-sponsored talks between Serbia and Kosovo, its former southern province.
