Two Serbian policemen injured near Kosovo

BELGRADE, Serbia, July 9 (UPI) -- Serbian police said two officers were injured Thursday in a grenade attack on their patrol car in southern Serbia near the border with Kosovo.

The two officers of the special gendarmerie unit were injured by shell fragments when the grenade fired from a portable launcher exploded near their car shortly after midnight Thursday at Lucane, a village in the predominantly ethnic Albanian area, the Serbian news agency Tanjug reported.

Lucane is near Bujanovac, 220 miles southeast of Belgrade.

The two men, one injured in the neck and the other in the back, were flown to the Military Academy medical center in Belgrade where doctors said their injuries were not serious.

Serbian Interior Minister Ivica Dacic in Belgrade said police and security forces will take action to contain any attempt to violate the territorial integrity of Serbia.

Bujanovac is in the Presevo valley area inhabited mostly by ethnic Albanians. The area borders Kosovo, whose Albanian leaders declared independence from Serbia in February 2008.

The Serbian government in Belgrade has refused to recognize Kosovo's independence.