BELGRADE, Oct 16 (Reuters) - Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica accused the United States on Tuesday of actively blocking a compromise solution for the breakaway province of Kosovo, whose Albanian majority demands independence.

"Every day, statements by American officials that Kosovo will become independent after Dec 10 ... aim to stop Kosovo Albanians from accepting a compromise solution for the province," he said in a statement.

The official news agency Tanjug quoted Kostunica as saying Washington's policy of "force" was an extension of NATO's 1999 bombing of Serbia "to deploy military forces in the province to take away 15 percent of our territory".

The statement echoed previous Serb charges that NATO, led by America, wants its own state in the Balkans, on Serb territory. NATO denies that and insists its intervention was aimed solely at stopping atrocities and ethnic cleansing by Serb forces.

There is no sign that Kosovo Albanian leaders would be open to compromise on independence, which has been the number one objective of the 90 percent Albanian majority since the United Nations took over Kosovo over eight years ago.

Western diplomats say Serb leaders need to come to terms with the fact that Serbia will not rule Kosovo again.

They say the status quo -- in which Kosovo is legally Serbia but actually an international protectorate -- is unstable and that trying to preserve it via Belgrade's offer of "95 percent autonomy" is bad for Serbia's own interests. Backed at the United Nations by Russia, Serbia has succeeded in stalling a plan for Kosovo's independence under European Union supervision, as devised by U.N. mediator Martti Ahtisaari after a year of talks failed to find compromise.

Serbs and Kosovo Albanians are now engaged in a fresh round of talks, mediated by the EU, the U.S. and Russia, who all insist they would prefer an agreement acceptable to both sides.

The 27-member EU, however, is split over how to respond if Kosovo declares independence unilaterally, and Serbia's efforts to single out the United States as driving Western policy on Kosovo may be aimed at widening that gap. U.S. State Dept. spokesman Tom Casey said on Monday that if talks fail to reach agreement by Dec. 10, "what we expect to see happen is for us to move forward...with supervised independence for Kosovo along the lines proposed by Mr. Ahtissari."

"We think independence is the solution and we think independence is the solution that Mr. Ahtissari came up with after an extensive series of meetings between the sides," he told a regular briefing.

The talks are due to resume next week in Vienna.

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