At an April 21 meeting, Kosovo prime minister Hashim Thaçi will ask United Nations Security Council members to recognise his country as independent, while Serbian president Boris Tadic will invoke international law to ask the UNSC to reject Kosovo’s independence.

This emerged from Kosovo and Serbian media reports ahead of the UNSC meeting, which is being held to discuss a quarterly report on Kosovo from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) chief Joachim Ruecker.

The Ban Ki-moon report says that UNSC Resolution 1244 remains in force until decided otherwise by the UNSC, and that UNMIK will continue to operate in line with the resolution.

Kosovo newspaper Koha Ditore reported on April 21 that apart from the request for recognition, Thaçi would also speak about political developments after Kosovo declared independence and also about Kosovo's vision for its future.

The newspaper quoted Tadic saying that he was going to the UNSC with the message that nobody could deny the right of Serbia to protect its legitimate rights in international law. He said that the first aim of Serbia was to influence that the UN states do not recognise Kosovo, and to argue for further negotiations on the status of Kosovo.

On April 21, Serbian news agency Beta, quoting diplomatic sources in Brussels and New York, said that the UN and the European Union supported new ideas on indirect or direct talks between Belgrade and Pristina on resolving practical issues regarding Kosovo.

Beta said that the proposal was for indirect talks between Serbia and Kosovo with UNMIK as intermediary.

Also expected to be discussed was Serbia’s intention to hold voting for its May 11 elections on Kosovo territory, a plan opposed by Kosovo.

Beta said that while in New York, Tadic was also expected to meet with Ban Ki-moon, Russian ambassador to the UN Vitaly Churkin, Chinese ambassador Wang Guangya, and South African ambassador to the UN Dumisani Shadrack Kumalo.