The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said he was ```expecting a consensus any moment'' on a `legal basis' for NATO action in Yugoslavia.``The alliance is going to say that military intervention is legal with regard to international law,'' the official added.

Recourse to a formal agreement on the issue was forced by Russian opposition to possible NATO action and a threat from Moscow that Russia would veto any attempt to secure a new UN resolution authorising strikes.

Members of the NATO began identifying the legal elements that are to constitute a solid basis for their action on Thursday. Since then several countries have come on board the US position that no further UN authorisation was needed.

NATO says it has sufficient UN authorisation under resolution 1199 which was passed last month under Chapter Seven of the UNCharter which permits the use of force.

The resolution demands that Yugoslavia withdraw its security forces from Kosovo, allow those displaced by the fighting to return home, permit aid agencies to assist refugees, and to begin talks on Kosovo's future.

Meanwhile, ethnic Albanian rebels in Kosovo have retaken control of villages in the central Drenica region, held by Serbian security forces since late September.

Reporters met members of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) on Friday in a number of villages in the region. ``The Serbs are just over there, in Likovac,'' said a young KLA fighter armed with an assault rifle, as he pointed to a hillside village less than two kilometres (about one mile) away. ``We are waiting for NATO airstrikes,'' he said with a smile. ``But if the big powers do not send ground troops, nothing will be sorted out.''Gornje Obrinje was the site of a massacre of 18 ethnic Albanian civilians, including women, pensioners and children. Their bodies were discovered two days after Serbianforces pulled out of the area. The neighbouring village of Donje Obrinje was also clearly under KLA control on Friday, and only a group of men and teenagers could be seen there.

They were listening to a radio for the latest news on the talks in Belgrade between US envoy Richard Holbrooke and Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, which were due to go into a second session on Friday evening.``I really hope Milosevic is not going to accept anything and that NATO will bomb,'' said a man in his forties, who appeared to be in charge of the group.

After their late September offensive in Kosovo, Serbian security forces said they had dismantled `terrorist bases' in Gornje Obrinje and Dornje Obrinje.Many houses in these villages had been set on fire and only a minority of the residents returned to their homes after the Serbians' departure. Sources close to the Serbian police said the KLA had also taken back control of the villages of Ovcarevo, Rezala and Makrmalj, near Likovac.

Ethnic Albanians interviewed onFriday claimed Serbian forces had bombed the area from positions in a nearby village overnight on Thursday, but neither people nor houses had been hit.