Talks between Serbia and Kosovo's ethnic Albanians to find a compromise solution for the future of the breakaway Serbian province ended in failure on Saturday, UN Special Envoy Martti Ahtisaari said, according to dpa. "I would have hoped and preferred that a negotiated solution could be found ... but there is no doubt that at the end of the day, there is no common ground between the parties," Ahtisaari said at a press conference in Vienna. Leaders from Belgrade and Pristina met in the Austrian capital on Saturday for a last round of talks before the status proposal is presented to the UN Security Council in late March. Ahtisaari said he would finalize his proposal in the coming weeks. Kosovo's ethnic Albanians, who constitute more than 90 per cent of the province's population, want full independence from Serbia. Belgrade, on the other hand, is only willing to grant far-reaching autonomy. In his proposal to the UN Security Council on Kosovo's future status Ahtisaari had proposed an internationally-monitored independence for the province. The Serbian delegation reiterated that Ahtisaari's proposal was "fundamentally not acceptable" to Belgrade, as it violated both the country's territorial integrity and the UN Charter. Serbian President Boris Tadic said Serbia nevertheless remained committed to negotiations. "We firmly believe that in the days ahead there is space and time to improve things that are not to our liking," Tadic said.
