BELGRADE, Dec 20 (Reuters) - A Serbian court on Thursday acquitted an ethnic Albanian man accused of war crimes against Serbs in the breakaway province of Kosovo in 1998.

Sinan Morina was released from custody after prosecutors failed to prove that he was, along with other members of the rebel Kosovo Liberation Army, involved in expulsions, torture and rape of Serbs in Kosovo, Judge Olivera Andjelkovic said.

The allegations dated from the war between Serbian forces and Albanian separatist guerrillas that led in 1999 to NATO's occupation of the province, which became a United Nations protectorate. "The prosecutors office will appeal," spokesman Bruno Vekaric told the state news agency Tanjug.

At the outset of his trial on Oct. 17 Morina denied all accusations, saying he had fled Kosovo and was in neighbouring Albania when the crimes happened.

Some 10,000 civilians, mainly Albanians, were killed in the Serbian crackdown. The subsequent pullout of Serbian security forces and the deployment of NATO peacekeepers were accompanied by a wave of Albanian revenge attacks that saw tens of thousands of Serbs flee Kosovo.

Kosovo's Albanian majority wants independence from Serbia, while Serbia offers full autonomy within Serbian sovereignty.

The U.N. Security Council discussed the impasse on Wednesday following a report that nearly two years of negotiation had failed to find any compromise, and the West says it plans to back a unilateral declaration of independence in 2008. (Reporting by Ksenija Prodanovic)

AlertNet news is provided by