HELSINKI - U.N. special envoy Martti Ahtisaari said on Tuesday he believed the status of the breakaway Serbian republic of Kosovo would be decided in the first quarter of 2008.

"I hope and believe the solution will come during the first quarter of the year," Ahtisaari said.

"What it will look like is another question."

Kosovo's 2 million Albanians are expected to declare independence in the first months of 2008. Belgrade is telling Serbs in Kosovo to ignore such a move, raising the prospect of an ethnic partition of the province.

Ahtisaari told Reuters at a Finnish Defence Ministry reception that not much was happening on the Kosovo question at the moment because the United Nations Security Council could not agree on the issue.

The Security Council has been hamstrung by a division between Western and Muslim states, which are ready to see Kosovo go independent, and Russia, which backs Serbia. Belgrade has been willing to offer only autonomy for the province.

Ahtisaari said he was not disappointed by the lack of progress in the Security Council. "Nothing surprising has happened."