President Clinton, speaking at a previously scheduled event in support of proposed domestic hate crime legislation, said Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic has the power to stop NATO bombing. If you think about the brave men and women who are working with our NATO allies today in Kosovo, and you remember that this basically all started 12 years ago when Mr. Milosevic decided to rally the support of his ethnic Serbian group by turning their hatred against the Kosovar Albanians, and later the Bosnian Muslims and the Croatian Catholics and the others, it is very important that we deal with these challenges here at home even as we continue to support the work of our people in uniform in the Balkans. I want to say again the United States would never choose force as anything other than a last option. And Mr. Milosevic could end it now by withdrawing his military police and paramilitary forces by accepting the difficult employment of an international security force to protect not only the Kosovar Albanians, most but not all of whom are Muslims, but also the Serbian minority in Kosovo. The Serbian foreign ministry pledged to work with the United Nations for the return of ethnic Albanian refugees, but the NATO allies said all indications were Serbian forces were still forcing more people out of Kosovo.
Thousands continue to arrive at border crossings in Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro and now Bosnia.
Even Russia announced it would send a million dollars worth of relief material even as it called the NATO air strikes acts of barbarity. But large quantities of aid haven't arrived yet and tens of thousands of people are still caught in desperate circumstances. Conditions are particularly bad in Blace, Macedonia. They are living in makeshift plastic shelters held up by sticks. The mud is ankle deep and pathways are running sewers.