Serbs go to polls with rivals neck and neck

Ian Traynor, Europe editor
Friday January 19, 2007
Guardian Unlimited
Serbia goes to the polls on Sunday for a crucial election that could return the pivotal Balkan state to nationalist instability or open up better prospects of integration with the EU and the west. Coming on top of war, revolution, isolation and assassination during the past decade, the ballot is seen as the most important since the fall of Slobodan Milosevic’s regime in 2000.

The election is also overshadowed by the fate of its southern province of Kosovo. Within weeks of Sunday’s poll, the international community is expected to impose a form of independence on the Albanian-majority province, redrawing Serbia’s borders in the final act of the disintegration of Yugoslavia.