Russians warn against 'imposed settlement' on Kosovo

UN: Serbian officials have again urged the UN to delay a final decision on Kosovo's bid for independence yesterday, while Russia is insisting it will only accept a solution acceptable to Belgrade.

Moscow's stance puts it at loggerheads with Washington and the EU, which favour monitored independence for the mostly Albanian province - an option that Serbia flatly rejects.

Serb prime minister Vojislav Kostunica, who faces an election battle with liberals and ultra-nationalists on Sunday, spoke to President Vladimir Putin this week and said the Russian leader told him that "the UN Security Council cannot support a solution by the special UN envoy for Kosovo, Martti Ahtisaari, that is not acceptable to Belgrade".

"Putin has stressed that a solution must be derived . . . from the principles of territorial integrity and sovereignty of existing countries," Mr Kostunica said, complaining that Serbia would lose 15 per cent of its territory if Kosovo broke away.

Russia has threatened to use its Security Council veto to block a resolution giving independence to Kosovo, which has been under UN control since Nato bombing ended a bloody Serb crackdown on the region's separatists in 1999.

Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said yesterday that the major powers would submit a final proposal to Belgrade and Kosovo's ethnic-Albanian government.

"Depending on the outcome of that, we will set out our own position," Mr Lavrov said. "There cannot be any imposed settlement of Kosovo's status."

Home to 2 million people, 90 per cent of them Albanian, Kosovo is becoming a battered political football. Washington and the EU want the province to be independent, to finally close the book on the break-up of Yugoslavia and claim success in an overwhelmingly Muslim region.

Russia, however, wants to delay the final outcome as long as possible to retain a bargaining chip in diplomatic dealings with the West, and Serb politicians are using the issue to win votes in Sunday's general election.

To avoid driving angry voters into the arms of the ultra-nationalists, the western powers postponed a planned decision on Kosovo's independence late last year.

But Vladeta Jankovic, the top diplomatic adviser to Mr Kostunica, reiterated calls yesterday for the final decision to be made only after the formation of a new Serb government - a process that could take months, and inflame Kosovo-Albanian anger.

Aides to Mr Ahtisaari and EU officials have suggested that there will not be another delay, however. "It is my impression that Ahtisaari will present to the parties at the beginning of February a proposal," EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said this week.