The parliament of Kosovo today voted unanimously to adopt a declaration of independence from Serbia, ending a long chapter in the bloody break-up of Yugoslavia.
"We the leaders of our people, democratically elected, through this declaration proclaim Kosovo an independent and sovereign state," Prime Minister Hashim Thaci told the assembly in the capital Pristina. "This declaration reflects the will of the people."
All 109 deputies present at the session voted in favour with a show of hands. Eleven deputies from ethnic minorities, including Serbs, were absent.
The United States and most European Union members are expected to recognise the new state. Serbia and Russia are fiercely opposed.
In Belgrade, Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica branded the southern region "a false state" in a televised address to his nation just minutes after the vote in Pristina. He said Kosovo was propped up unlawfully by the United States which was "ready to violate the international order for its own military interests".
President Boris Tadic urged international organisations "to immediately annul this act, which violates the basic principles of international law".
Serbs have vowed never to give up a territory in which their history goes back 1,000 years. But the West supports the demand of Kosovo's two million ethnic Albanians for their own state, nine years after Nato went to war to save them from Serbian forces.
Kosovo's Prime Minister Hashim Thaci
Kosovo will be the sixth state carved from the former Serbian-dominated Yugoslav federation since 1991, after Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia, Bosnia and Montenegro.
Serbs in the north of Kosovo, adjoining Serbia proper, will reject independence, cementing an ethnic partition that will weigh on the new state for years to come. Fewer than half of Kosovo's 120,000 remaining Serbs live in the north, while the rest are in scattered enclaves protected by Nato peacekeepers.
Mr Thaci sought to reassure them, saying "Kosovo is the homeland of all its citizens." He said Kosovo was committed to a Western-backed plan for independence, supervised by the European Union and providing guarantees for the Serb minority.
The EU, which yesterday endorsed a rule-of-law mission to Kosovo, will meet tomorrow to discuss the territory's secession after years of economic and political limbo as a ward of the United Nations.
The United States and most EU members are expected to quickly recognise Kosovo, despite failing to win a new UN Security Council resolution sanctioning the move. Russia blocked its adoption last year.
President George W. Bush said the United States, which has 1,700 troops in Kosovo's Nato-led force of 16,000, was determined to keep the peace. "The United States will continue to work with our allies to do the very best we can to make sure there's no violence," he said during a visit to Tanzania.
The European Union will deploy a rule-of-law mission of some 2,000 starting next month to take over from the United Nations. The Nato-led peace force, which includes 300 Irish troops, will stay on.
Backed by Russia, Serbia says the mission is illegitimate without a UN mandate. Serbia promised reprisals but kept them secret. Analysts believe any trade, diplomatic or bureaucratic blockade will be relatively short-lived.
Most EU countries, including Ireland, are likely to recognize the new state rapidly but at least six - Cyprus, Greece, Slovakia, Spain, Bulgaria and Romania - have indicated they will not do so immediately.