EU sees Serb poll as chance to seal ties

By David Brunnstrom and Mark John

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Union officials said on Monday they were confident voters in Serbia would back pro-EU parties in a forthcoming parliamentary election after its 10-month-old coalition collapsed over the loss of Kosovo.

The bloc also made a strong appeal to the United Nations mission in Kosovo to ensure the protection of the border with Serbia amid fears of a partition of Serb-dominated northern Kosovo from the rest of the overwhelmingly Albanian territory.

Serbia's ruling coalition was dissolved at a cabinet meeting on Monday after nationalist Serb Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica failed to force a decision suspending ties with the EU as long as its members backed Kosovo's independence.

"Serbia is facing a challenge, it is facing a choice of either going towards Europe or staying nationalistic," Slovenian Foreign Minister Dimitrij Rupel, whose country holds the EU's presidency, said after EU foreign ministers met in Brussels.

"Of course we want Serbia to choose Europe," he added.

A majority of the EU's 27 states have recognized the independence of Kosovo, which seceded from Serbia last month. The EU has begun deploying a police and justice mission to help supervise its institutions, causing deep anger in Belgrade.

Serbia pro-Western President Boris Tadic only narrowly won re-election last month. The subsequent loss of Kosovo left many Serbs smarting and triggered mass protests and some attacks on the embassies of countries that backed its independence.

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said the EU must now extend "the hand of friendship" to Serbia and External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said it was time to offer Serbs easier visa procedures and other incentives.

DUTCH INSIST NO SAA SIGNING

Others said an interim accord establishing a framework for ties in such areas as trade was still on the table, despite Belgrade's rejection of it days before Tadic's poll victory.

But the Netherlands insisted it would continue to block a move to sign a so-called stabilization and association agreement (SAA), the first formal step on the long road to EU accession, until Belgrade showed full cooperation in hunting war criminals.

"EU integration and cooperation is also based on values -- and one of those values is the position where impunity is not accepted," Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen said.

The EU has initialed an SAA with Belgrade but resistance by the Netherlands and Belgium has stopped it signing the accord until Serbia cooperates fully to arrest war crimes fugitives such as Ratko Mladic, indicted for alleged genocide in the 1992-95 Bosnian war.

EU diplomats said the EU would ask U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to ensure the UNMIK police mission in Kosovo did not slacken in the run-up to an expected handover of duties to the EU-led police and judicial operation there from mid-June.

"There have been attacks on this border, burning of containers and so on, so UNMIK has a very important role to play," Rupel said.