(Adds Curtis resignation)

By Matt Robinson

PRISTINA, Serbia, Feb 14 (Reuters) - The United Nations police chief in Kosovo resigned on Wednesday at the request of the province's U.N. governor following the deaths of two Albanian demonstrators in a weekend protest rally.

The clashes between police and ethnic Albanian protesters marked the worst violence since March 2004 and underscored Western fears of widespread civil unrest if a decision on the Albanian majority's demand for independence does not come soon.

U.N. overseer Joachim Ruecker told a morning news conference he had asked police commissioner Stephen Curtis to resign with immediate effect "on the principle of political accountability".

Curtis said later he had quit "to allay some of the fears that the public has about the police and policing of Kosovo."

"We are at a critical juncture in the history of Kosovo, and nothing must be allowed to interfere with the confidence of those involved in this process," said Curtis, a Briton who led the 1,800-strong U.N. police force in the province.

Two men died following Saturday's protest from head injuries caused by police rubber bullets. Curtis said at the time U.N. and Kosovo police had been compelled to take "defensive measures" when protesters tried to force their way through barricades around parliament in the capital Pristina.

Kosovo Prime Minister Agim Ceku complained of "excessive force" and Interior Minister Fatmir Rexhepi resigned on Monday, accepting "moral responsibility" for the deaths. The two victims, aged 30 and 34, were among 3,000 people protesting against a U.N. plan for the province which many Albanians said falls short of full independence from Serbia.

FRESH PROTESTS

NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer was due in Kosovo on Thursday to discuss the security situation with commanders of 16,500 NATO-led peacekeepers in the territory.

Protest leader Albin Kurti has been remanded in custody for 30 days, but his supporters on Wednesday promised fresh demonstrations to coincide with a final round of Serb-Albanian talks on Kosovo's fate starting Feb. 21 in Vienna.

About 90 percent of Kosovo's 2 million people are ethnic Albanians. The province has been run by the United Nations since 1999 when NATO bombs drove out Serb forces accused of atrocities in a two-year war with guerrillas.

A U.N. plan unveiled this month, if adopted by the U.N. Security Council, would set the province on the path to independence supervised by the European Union.

Kosovo Albanian leaders have accepted the blueprint, drafted by former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari after months of fruitless Serb-Albanian talks.

But some Albanians say its provisions for EU supervision and Serb self-government will only prolong Kosovo's limbo status.

Before his arrival in Kosovo last July, Curtis held a variety of senior police positions in Britain and also served as a lecturer at the UK National Police Staff College on the management of disaster and civil emergency.

His deputy, Norwegian Trygve Kalleberg, who took up his post on the day of the demonstration, said a police investigation would focus on the decision to use rubber bullets.

A 26-year-old man remains in a coma at the U.S. Army's Camp Bondsteel base in Kosovo.

(Additional reporting by Fatos Bytyci)

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