(BRUSSELS) - The United States wants the international community to regain control over Kosovo's "lawless" northern, Serb-dominated region, a senior US diplomat said Tuesday.

"The north of Kosovo is now a lawless area," US assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs Daniel Fried told AFP. "There has to be a presence in the north."

"We can't allow the situation in Kosovo to drift. Things will start to deteriorate. We can't wait," said Fried, who was in Brussels for talks with EU and NATO officials.

Fried said the "reconfiguration" of the roles played by the UN peacekeeping mission in Kosovo known as UNMIK and the European Union's EULEX police and justice operation, in which the US plays a role, "has to happen".

About 90 percent of Kosovo's two million population is ethnic Albanian. A large part of the Serb minority lives in the north and it has rejected Kosovo's declaration of independence five months ago and the Pristina authorities.

Defiant Serbs in Kosovo held municipal and legislative elections on May 11 at the same as elections in Serbia and there have been outbreaks of violence since the declaration of independence.

"The situation has to go back to some kind of lasting norm," said Fried, acknowledging that the international community had to "take steps cautiously to resolve" the issue.

Currently only 400 of the some 1,900 police officers and judges foreseen by the EULEX mission are in place.

After receiving the green light from UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in June, EULEX is due to be entirely deployed in the autumn, taking over partly from UNMIK, which has administered the territory since 1999.

NATO has a force nearly 17,000-strong deployed in Kosovo to provide security.

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