The talks which are being held in Vienna, have gathered Serbia's delegation consisting of President Boris Tadic and Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica and Kosovo's delegation led by President Fatmir Sejdiu and Prime Minister Agim Ceku.
According to the Reuters agency, "entering separately, the presidents and prime ministers of Serbia and Kosovo sat either side of a square table and posed stiffly for photographers in the Gothic Room of the 16th century Vienna palace. There were no handshakes."
Upon their arrival in the palace, Austrian Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik told reporters that she was expecting both sides to demonstrate more realism and engagement.
The one-day UN-led talks are seen as an opportunity for officials of the two sides to exchange their positions.
The negotiations between Belgrade and Pristina began six months ago with ministerial meetings on some important elements of the future organisation of Kosovo, such as the decentralisation of Kosovo, the ethnic minorities' rights and the protection of religious and cultural heritage of the 100,000-strong Serb community there. Little progress has been made in those talks.
About 90 percent of the two-million population in Kosovo are Albanians who insist on independence and who refuse any notion about having any formal ties with Serbia after the regime of Serbian autocrat Slobodan Milosevic committed atrocities against the local population in 1990s until the 1999 NATO-led air strikes which drove out the Serbian forces from the province.
Albert Rohan, the deputy of Martti Ahtisari, the UN Chief Negotiator for Kosovo, was quoted by the Austrian ORF radio as saying today that in case the two sides' top officials failed to reach agreement, the UN Security Council would have to make a decision on the matter.
The term of the UN Chief Envoy for Kosovo, Finnish diplomat Ahtisari, and his deputy Rohan, expires by the end of this year.