War in the Balkans: Briefing: Day 56

The aid agency Oxfam warned that relief efforts were in danger of failing refugees from Kosovo because they were not properly co-ordinated. There was an urgent need for a more coherent response by the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR), aid agencies, donor governments and Macedonia and Albania, where most of the refugees have fled. UNHCR should take a more robust leadership role, as donor governments were setting up camps independently.

The parents of the first Kosovo refugee baby born in Britain since the Nato bombing campaign against Yugoslavia said yesterday they had named their son after Tony Blair. Toni Bislimi was delivered at a Glasgow maternity hospital on Monday, a week after his parents, Sanije and Enver Bislimi, and his brother and two sisters arrived from a Macedonian refugee camp. Asked why they named their child after the British leader, Mr Bislimi said, "I am just so thankful to this country."

Pope John Paul and the German Chancellor, Gerhard Schroder, discussed the conflict in the Balkans yesterday and the need for a "just and honourable" solution to the crisis.

Ukraine's Foreign Minister, Borys Tarasiuk, left for Brussels yesterday to meet Nato secretary-general, Javier Solana, to discuss Ukrainian initiatives to end the Kosovo crisis.