At the heart of the Kosovo conflict that erupted into large-scale violence in the late 1990s was a struggle between two ethnic groups and their irreconcilable national agendas.
On one side was an increasingly nationalist Serbian government in Belgrade and ethnic Serbs living in Kosovo who wanted to maintain Serbia control of what was then an "autonomous" province of Serbia.
On the other side was the majority ethnic Albanian population of Kosovo, which at first rebelled against Serbia infringements on autonomy and then fought for an independent state.