NATO HITS EMBASSY; CHINESE DENOUNCE BELGRADE ATTACK.

Byline: Steven Lee Myers The New York Times

NATO forces that were pounding the center of Belgrade hit and badly damaged the Chinese embassy Friday night, only hours after knocking out electrical power across much of the country. Yugoslav authorities immediately reported numerous injuries, both inside and outside the embassy, which they said held 26 people at the time, and offered conflicting accounts about fatalities. China said two of its citizens were killed and two more were missing.

China quickly denounced the attack and Friday night called an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council, which convened just before midnight. ``We are greatly shocked by the reports of NATO's bombing of the Chinese Embassy,'' China's ambassador to the United Nations, Qin Huasun said, ``NATO's barbarian act is a violation of the U.N. Charter.''

In a statement released late Friday, NATO said it had conducted its ``most concentrated attack to date'' against Yugoslavia's capital since the air war began on March 24. It also acknowledged mistakenly bombing a hospital complex and marketplace in Nis, an attack which the Yugoslav government said had killed 15 people.

Among the targets in Belgrade was another of Milosevic's residences, beneath which was a major bunker complex that NATO described as the war-time political and military headquarters for the Yugoslav government.

``NATO has information that suggests this is now the center of Mr. Milosevic's high command, following the destruction and damage done to other command facilities,'' NATO's statement said.

NATO said it did not mean to hit the Chinese Embassy. ``NATO regrets any damage to the embassy or injuries to Chinese diplomatic personnel,'' the statement said.

Although NATO and U.S. officials offered no explanation for how NATO could have hit the embassy, NATO did target the Hotel Yugoslavia, which is close by. The officials said that this hotel has been taken over as a headquarters and barracks for the special paramilitary police, headed by Zeljko Raznjatovic, who is known as Arkan.

A senior Pentagon official declined to say whether NATO's barrage was intended to kill him or any other Yugoslav leaders, including Milosevic, but NATO's statement could be read as implying as much. ``These strikes were planned to disrupt the national leadership of military and special police operations,'' the statement said.

The barrage Friday night came after a day in which NATO faced new questions about the consequences of its air war. Moments before reports of the midnight strike against the embassy, NATO officials acknowledged that cluster bombs dropped from an F-16 fighter jet had caused extensive damage to a hospital complex and marketplace in Nis, Yugoslavia's third largest city.

Yugoslav officials, who escorted journalists to the scene in Nis, reported that an additional 60 to 70 people were wounded. Dismembered bodies lay on a street nearby around yellow casings from the cluster bombs. The bombs, after detonating, cover target with smaller bomblets that float to the ground with small parachutes.

The damage to the embassy, which is in the new section of the capital west of the Sava River, is certain to add still more tumult to already strained relationship with NATO and the United States for China, which has been sharply critical of NATO's air war. On Thursday, China's foreign ministry called on NATO to halt the bombing, saying it had caused ``great civilian casualties.''

As a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council, China has veto power over any settlement of the conflict that would have the international body's imprimatur.

On Thursday, the Foreign Ministry of China called on NATO to halt the bombing, saying that it had caused ``great civilian casualties.'' Friday night, Qin, the representative to the United Nations, said, ``We call on NATO to stop immediately its military actions, so as to avoid further humanitarian disasters.''

The White House immediately reached out to China's embassy in Washington to inform its diplomats of the strike, an administration official said. Later, America's ambassador to China, James Sasser, spoke with Chinese government officials in Beijing, the official said.

The U.N. secretary-general, Kofi Annan, was ``shocked and distressed'' at the report, his spokesman said.

Despite the questions about casualties, officials vowed to press ahead with the air war and predicted that a heavy night of bombardment - including aircraft and cruise missiles fired from ships in the Adriatic - was expected across the country.