Det kokar i Kosovo. Vattenfall har torkat ut, min kompis Samarie tittar på skogsbränder genom fönstret på sitt kontor, och nyheterna ser ut såhär:

Kosovo eyes November 28 independence declaration Fri Jul 20 12:38:46 UTC 2007

By Matt Robinson

PRISTINA, Serbia (Reuters) - Kosovo Prime Minister Agim Ceku called on parliament on Friday to declare unilateral independence from Serbia on November 28, faced with diplomatic stalemate between the West and Russia at the United Nations.

Western powers looked likely on Friday to shelve the latest U.N. draft resolution on the fate of the U.N.-run province, under threat of a Russian veto.

Ceku said the United Nations had failed and challenged Kosovo's Western backers to support a unilateral declaration in four months, a move the United States has suggested it would back, but which would split the 27-member European Union.

He said the Kosovo parliament should adopt a resolution setting the date on his return from Washington, where on Monday he is due to meet U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

"November 28 is a day of celebration," he said when asked by reporters why he had chosen that day.

November 28 marks independence day in neighboring Albania, a date also celebrated by Kosovo's 90-percent Albanian majority.

"The United Nations has failed to act," Ceku said after meeting U.N. Kosovo governor Joachim Ruecker. "My idea is a way out of this situation. We are offering our partners a solution."

Ceku said he proposed the move to President Fatmir Sejdiu and opposition leaders, but did not say whether they had agreed.

Kosovo had shied away from setting a deadline without explicit Western support, and some ethnic Albanian leaders fear it will only antagonize their backers.

Technically, the U.N. mission would have to annul any unilateral declaration, and risk a violent backlash.

"We understand this as a qualified proposal by the prime minister, and of course that any decision would be based on consultations with the international community," said U.N. mission spokesman Alexander Ivanko.

DIFFERENT OPTIONS

Russia is frustrating Western efforts to steer Kosovo's secession through the United Nations, eight years since NATO allies wrested control of the territory from Serbia to halt the killing of Albanians in a two-year counter-insurgency war.

The Russian foreign ministry said a unilateral declaration would resolve nothing. "It will only create an abscess," said spokesman Mikhail Kamynin.

Moscow has rejected the latest draft U.N. resolution, which would mandate the EU to take over from the U.N. mission and calls for another 120 days of Serb-Albanian talks in a bid to win Russia's support. Moscow says it still amounts to independence for Kosovo, which Belgrade has ruled out.

In New York, Britain's U.N. ambassador, Emyr Jones Parry, said progress in the U.N. Security Council was unlikely, so the West was "looking energetically at the different options."

Envoys of the Contact Group on Kosovo - the United States, Britain, Germany, France, Italy and Russia - are to meet next week to discuss launching another 120 days of shuttle diplomacy.

Thirteen months of Serb-Albanian talks ended in stalemate in March, before U.N. mediator Martti Ahtisaari proposed independence supervised by the European Union.

The EU says it needs a U.N. resolution, not least to deploy its largest ever civilian mission. Ceku said the Kosovo parliament resolution would invite the EU to deploy.

The West sees little prospect of forcing Kosovo Albanians back into the arms of Belgrade, but Serb ally Russia says any solution at the United Nations must have Serbian consent.

Serbia said the choice of November 28 pointed to the creation of a Greater Albania, something Kosovo and Albania have rejected.

"A unilateral declaration of independence would do them more harm than good," said senior Serb official Dusan Prorokovic.

(Additional reporting by Fatos Bytyci, Ksenija Prodanovic in Belgrade, Evelyn Leopold in New York and Christian Lowe and James Kilner in Moscow)

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