Serbia will fight with all diplomatic means to keep its breakaway province of Kosovo from becoming independent, although its negotiating position is weak, Serbian President Boris Tadic said.

 

In an interview on state television on Tuesday night, Tadic repeated Serbia could not give up part of its territory but admitted it had little room to maneuver.

 

Tadic, expected to attend key talks at the end of July in a UN-mediated process to decide Kosovo's future, said Serbia's opposition to independence for the Albanian-majority province was not enough to prevent its secession.

 

"The reality is very difficult, it has never been harder. I want to say this to the citizens of Serbia, I do not have the right to deceive them," Tadic said.

 

"But we have to fight until the last minute using legitimate means accepted by international politics today."

 

Kosovo has been run by the UN since June 1999 when NATO bombs drove out Serb forces accused of atrocities against civilians while battling a guerrilla insurgency.

 

Ethnic Albanians, who make up 90 percent of the province's 2 million people, demand independence. Serbia says Kosovo should stay within its borders and get "substantial autonomy."

 

UN-mediated talks started in Vienna in February, dealing with practical issues such as minority and religious rights. The West wants a settlement this year.

 

Tadic said there was a security risk as long as negotiations on the future of the province continued.

 

"Kosovo is not a stable area, but the risk is not such that citizens should expect war," Tadic said.

 

"I think there will be no more wars in the Balkans, at least in the foreseeable future."

 

Such wars were impossible because Balkan countries hoped to join the EU and NATO, he said.

 

He warned that any final decision on Kosovo should guarantee enough rights to the province's minority ethnic Serbs.

 

"An exodus should be prevented, not by physical barriers but by guaranteeing the rights of the population," Tadic said.

 

Diplomats fear the province's 100,000 ethnic Serbs half its pre-war Serb population could flee if Kosovo becomes independent. Ghettoized and targeted by sporadic violence, many say they will not live in an Albanian state.

 

Tadic said independence would be traumatic for Serbs.

 

"A new trauma would be unjust and also counterproductive, this country would not be politically stable," Tadic said.

 

Serbia's ultranationalist Radical Party, which has said it will never accept independence for Kosovo, is supported by some 40 percent of Serbs. Bitterness over Kosovo could boost it further and eventually put it in government.

 

(China Daily July 13, 2006)