The Coca-Cola patrol: On the beat with U.N. police in Kosovo

	GALLERY
Spanish police officers of the U.N. Mission in Kosovo, Daniel Martinez (blue cap, sunglasses) and Ricardo Fernandez, search two men who were sitting in a car on the side of the road in Pristina. The officers released the men when they found no weapons and no evidence the car was stolen.

By Steve Nettleton
CNN Interactive Correspondent

PRISTINA, Kosovo (CNN) -- As a squad of British soldiers escorts a pair of U.N. police officers down a muddy downtown street, a car pulls over to the curb in front of them.

Four armed men file out, one conspicuously toting a Kalashnikov assault rifle, and pass within meters of the surprised police and peacekeepers.

Their solid pea-green uniforms bear red shoulder patches. The British soldiers say they are members of the Kosovo Protection Corps (KPC), a civil force composed primarily of former members of the Kosovo Liberation Army.

The KPC -- founded to serve as a sort of national guard to help rebuild destroyed homes, repair roads and assist in clearing mines -- is supposed to be unarmed. A few senior officers may carry side arms. No one is supposed to carry an assault weapon.

The commander of the British patrol casts a wary eye as the men disappear into a restaurant. He gives no order to move in. This is not a fight he wants to pick. At least not tonight.

The brazenness with which the KPC members challenged the patrol is revealing. It shows just how difficult it is for the peacekeepers and police to earn the confidence of the people they are trying to protect in Kosovo.

More than 420 murders have been reported since June. A wave of arson attacks continues, though it has declined in recent weeks. Organized crime has established thriving enterprises in drug trafficking, cigarette and liquor smuggling, and car theft.

Justice on a shoestring

REPORTER'S NOTEBOOK • Reporter's journey reveals the prospects for peace are as elusive as ever • Macedonia struggles to avoid Kosovo's deadly legacy • Still missing: Albanians seek relatives in Serbian jails • Mitrovica: Symbol of divided Kosovo • A sprawling enclave of Americana in Kosovo • House arrest: Kosovo's segregated Serbs feel stranded, abandoned • The Coca-Cola patrol: On the beat with U.N. police in Kosovo • New tragedies burden historic Serb city • Montenegro press avoids Belgrade's big chill • Montenegro president: We will not compromise with Serbia • One faith, two churches: Religion splits again in Yugoslavia • Sarajevo: A city searches for its lost soul

Some 2,000 police from 42 countries are on loan in Kosovo. Another 600 are expected to arrive by spring, just before some of the current officers finish their one-year assignments and return home.

A Kosovar-run police force is to eventually assume the responsibility of maintaining law and order, but training and building one will take time, U.N. police say.

Perhaps the biggest obstacle to securing law and order is the ill-functioning court system. Jails fill quickly because understaffed courts cannot process cases. With no spare cells, the police arrest only those suspected of the most serious offenses.

"We tell officers that unless there is a serious crime, these people will not stay in jail," said Gilles Moreau of Canada, spokesman for the U.N. Mission in Kosovo police. "All you can do is get their names, photograph them, fingerprint them and let them go."

On the edge in Pristina

In their bright red-and-white SUVs, nicknamed "Coca-Colas" by Kosovars, the U.N. police weave through clogged city streets, stopping to investigate anything that seems out of the ordinary.

The real things: Kosovars call U.N. police vehicles "Coca-Colas"

They also perform a humanitarian mission. They take food and supplies to Serbs who refuse to venture outside their KFOR-protected homes or apartments for fear of revenge attacks.

"Now they are giving us another job," says officer Ricardo Fernandez of Spain. "Now they want us to start controlling traffic."

I am on patrol in Pristina with Fernandez and his partner, Daniel Martinez, also from Spain. Fernandez says this and laughs as he points to a busy intersection we are approaching.

With no traffic lights, the junction is in chaos. Cars and trucks from four directions try to squeeze through simultaneously. Horns wail. Drivers scream out their windows. Somehow the vehicles move through without incident.

"Sometimes you hear that it's worse when we control the traffic," Fernandez says. "They have their own way of driving. They know how to handle their own traffic jams."

'We have to be flexible'

As we drive along Pristina's main boulevard, Mother Teresa Street, Martinez notices a black hatchback with tinted windows parked on the other side of the road. He makes a U-turn and pulls up behind the car.

They search two young men sitting inside, then inspect the back. Through a translator, the Spanish officers ask the men for a driver's license. Neither man has one. Serbian police took their IDs from them last year, they say. Such confiscations were widely reported before the Serbs withdrew in mid-1999.

After a few more questions, the officers wave goodbye and return to the SUV.

"We have to be flexible," Fernandez says. "If we aren't sure that a car is stolen, all we can do is check it and make sure they don't have any weapons."

I ask Fernandez, a native of the Canary Islands, if it is frustrating to work as a police officer in Kosovo.

"Sometimes," he says. "Sometimes you know even when you arrest someone and start filling out the paperwork, you know that they are going to go free. But we have to do our job. That's the way it is. Perhaps in a few months it will be different."

'In Kosovo, you can't be an optimist'

Later that evening, I set out on a foot patrol with KFOR troops from a British outfit and two police officers -- one an American, the other a Romanian.

The patrol wanders off the main streets and into dark and deserted back lots.

NATO bombs damaged this post and telephone office in central Pristina

The soldiers spot two men in a car on a muddy track. They surround the vehicle and order its occupants out to be searched. Like most searches, they find nothing and leave the frightened men wondering why they had attracted the attention of heavily armed troops.

In the climate of violence that developed after Kosovar Albanians began to return last summer, KFOR and the police take no chances.

The patrol next climbs the steps of a commercial center and gathers around the entrance to a popular bar. The squad leader sets up the assignment.

"We're going to go in and do a table-to-table search," he says. "First, to be polite, we'll ask the owner if it's okay. If he says no, we search it anyway."

The soldiers march into the crowded bar and announce their mission. They block the door. No one is allowed to enter or to leave. For the next 15 minutes the soldiers frisk each person in the room.

Many bar-goers laugh as they are searched in front of their companions. Most of the people appear more curious about me and my camera than they do about the British soldiers.

Again, the peacekeepers and police find nothing. They politely thank the people for their cooperation and head back to the sidewalk.

A relatively quiet day on the streets of Pristina comes to an end. As the soldiers and police return to their bases, however, they know violence could erupt at any moment.

"It's been much calmer these days," officer Fernandez of Spain told me earlier in the day. "But here in Kosovo, you can't be an optimist."