UN's Ahtisaari outlines Kosovo's path to statehood

BELGRADE, Feb 2 (Reuters) United Nations envoy Martti Ahtisaari said today Serbs and ethnic Albanians had 'one more chance' for a compromise in talks this month on the future status of Serbia's breakaway Kosovo province.

''The positions of the parties are extremely fixed ... we are giving (them) one more chance'' in the month of February, he told a news conference in Belgrade.

Ahtisaari presented Serb President Boris Tadic with a proposal giving Kosovo the right to access international institutions, but said it would continue to be supervised internationally and patrolled by NATO.

The former Finnish president mediated months of largely fruitless talks in 2006 in search of a compromise between Serbia and leaders of Kosovo's 90 per cent Albanian majority.

Ahtisaari will also present his plan in Kosovo's capital Pristina, where leaders of the 90 per cent Albanian majority have long pressed for full independence.

Kosovo has been run by the UN since 1999 when 11 weeks of bombing by NATO forced the late Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic to withdraw his forces, accused of killing 10,000 Albanians during a counter-insurgency war.

REUTERS AB PM1947