Serbs vote for parliament

11/05/2008

BELGRADE, Serbia -- Serbs went to the polls on Sunday (May 11th) to elect their next parliament, in a vote which may amount to a referendum on Serbia's future EU accession. The latest poll results show that the nationalist Serbian Radical Party has the support of about 35% of all Serbs entitled to vote, followed closely by the pro-European alliance gathered around President Boris Tadic, with about 34%.

Election stations opened at 7am local time and will close at 8pm. Local elections will be held in parallel with the parliamentary vote, including in the Serb-dominated municipalities of Kosovo.

Ahead of the election, the government approved two key documents at a session on Friday. The first was the Stabilisation and Association agreement signed with the EU. Outgoing Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica and the cabinet members from his Serbian Democratic Party-New Serbia alliance walked out of the session, refusing to sign the agreement. They returned later to back the second document, an energy agreement with Russia. It was adopted unanimously. (Tanjug, ITAR-TASS, BBC, Xinhua, Bloomberg, AFP, Blic - 09/05/08)