2 dead, 11 hurt as shops bombed

PRISTINA - An explosion killed two people and injured 11 when it tore through shops yesterday in the capital of Serbia's breakaway Kosovo province. The explosion scattered glass and debris from a dozen shops on Pristina's Bill Clinton Boulevard. Part of a building collapsed.

The blast, the cause of which was not known, comes at a time of rising tension within Kosovo's 90 per cent ethnic Albanian majority over its stalled bid for independence from Serbia. Leaders of Serbia and Kosovo are due to hold negotiations on the territory's fate on Friday on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.

Pristina has seen small bomb attacks at times of political tension over the past three years.

- Reuters