The decision to leave Yugoslav forces in possession of the key Kosovo town of Malisevo is seen as yet another attempt at brinkmanship by President Slobodan Milosevic. For Serbian police to remain there is clearly in breach of the ceasefire agreement arranged by the US envoy, Mr Richard Holbrooke, but it is not being regarded as important enough to warrant an air strike.
While keeping up the pressure in Kosovo, Mr Milosevic has, in recent days, made some remarkable decisions back home in Belgrade. In what has been the biggest purge of his personal entourage, he has fired most of his closest advisers and replaced them with people known to be loyal supporters of his wife Ms Mirjana Markovic.
Gone is General Momcilo Perisic who signed the Kosovo peace agreement on the Yugoslav side. Out too is the head of Yugoslav security services, Mr Jovica Stanisic, along with a dozen leading security operatives. The deputy leader of Mr Milosevic's own party, Mr Milorad Vucevic, has also lost his job as has the head of the air force, General Ljubisa Velickovic.
All these leading officials have been replaced by hard-line political supporters of Ms Markovic who are known for their absolute loyalty to the regime and who can be counted upon in the event of any attempt to remove Mr Milosevic from power.
For this reason, the purge is being seen as a sign of Mr Milosevic's weakness rather than his strength. It has been amply shown that Serbs are capable of turning against Mr Milosevic. The massive demonstrations in Belgrade in 1996 and 1997 have been a witness to the basic instability of his regime. General Perisic's statement, after his dismissal, that he was: "still at the disposal of the army, the people and the state," has heightened the feeling of insecurity even further. A Montengrin by birth, General Perisic is understood to be supported by the president of Montenegro, Mr Milo Djukanovic, raising the spectre of a split between Yugoslavia's two remaining component republics.
It should be remembered too that General Perisic's record includes leading the Yugoslav army in Bosnia at a time when his forces committed some appalling atrocities. In Kosovo, however, his opposition to the use of soldiers against ethnic Albanian civilians is understood to have roused the anger of the bloodthirsty Ms Markovic.
What Mr Milosevic and Ms Markovic appear to be doing now is circling the wagons around themselves and their entourage in advance of an attack from within their own country. They have managed to keep paying the Serbian police despite the country's shrinking economy. Exactly when Mr Milosevic will need to call on this 90,000-strong force remains to be seen but 1999 may be the year in which history finally catches up with the Yugoslav dictator.