United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said on Friday he would recommend to the Security Council later on Friday that talks begin "very soon" on the future status of the disputed Serbian province of Kosovo, according to Reuters. "Today I will inform the Security Council that I want to open discussions about the status of Kosovo very soon," he told journalists during a visit to the Swiss capital. Kosovo has been under U.N. administration, and the protection of NATO's biggest peacekeeping operation, since mid-1999, when Serbian forces were driven out to stop what the West said was their persecution of the ethnic Albanian majority.