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Last key rebel Serb town falls to Croatian army

ZAGREB: Rebel Serbs lost their last important town to the Croatian army, capping a surprisingly swift rout of insurgents who started Yugoslavia's breakup in 1991, the government said on Monday.

The state news agency HINA quoted a government statement as saying Glina, 50 km (30 miles) southwest of Zagreb and one of the original strongholds of the Krajina Serb revolt, was taken by government troops just before midnight on Sunday.

U.N. peacekeepers, who were brushed aside in the Croatian army blitz to retake separatist Krajina, could not immediately verify Glina's capture but had said earlier that it was surrounded and could not hold out long.

It was not immediately clear what the fall of Glina would mean for at least 15,000 Serb refugees who had collected in a small pocket of remaining rebel terrain west of the town hoping for U.N.-guided safe passage to nearby Bosnia.

The Croatian government said on Sunday, three days into the military campaign, that the Krajina enclave had effectively ceased to exist and it was busy setting up local institutions.

Tens of thousands of Serbs, fearing reprisals for expelling Croat neighbours in 1991, have ignored Zagreb's appeals to stay with guarantees of safety and fled towards Bosnia, creating the worst humanitarian crisis in former Yugoslavia since 1992.-Reuter