BELGRADE - Two policemen were injured on Thursday in a hand grenade attack in a southern Serbian town near the Kosovo border, state news agency Tanjug reported.

The policemen, serving with Serbia's special police unit, were on regular patrol when a hand grenade was thrown at their vehicle minutes after midnight on Thursday, the agency quoted Interior Minister Ivica Dacic as saying.

The incident occurred in the town of Lucani, near Bujanovac, the administrative centre of the area called Presevo Valley that has a large Albanian population.

The Presevo Valley, bordering Kosovo, was the scene of insurgency in 2000-01 when the Liberation Army of Presevo, Bujanovac and Medvedja sought unsuccessfully to form a union with Kosovo. NATO and the European Union helped end the insurgency in the Presevo Valley in 2001 but Albanians in the region are angry at lack of economic development and investment.

Serbia lost control over Kosovo in 1999 after NATO bombed to halt the killing of ethnic Albanians in a two-year counter insurgency war.

Kosovo Albanians, who make up 90 percent of the population, declared the independence from Serbia in 2008, but Serbia refuses to recognise Kosovo and had sought the ruling of the International Court of Justice on the legality of the move.