Serbian Elections

There are nine candidates standing in the presidential elections on Sunday, Jan. 20, but only two of them are seen as having a real chance of winning: the current president Boris Tadic and Tomislav Nikolic, whose nationalistic and anti-Western politics have gained popularity at home thanks to the European Union's backing of Kosovo's Albanian government.

Polls and analysts say neither of the two favorites will get a first round majority, and Tadic and Nikolic will fight a run-off on Feb. 3, a repeat of the last election in 2004.

Democratic Party leader Tadic, who in 2004 became Serbia's first non-Communist president since World War II, has made it clear he sees his country's future with the European Union.

"These elections are about choosing between two paths -- in the direction of Europe, which brings more stability and a better life, or the path of fools that directs Serbia back to the 1990s," Tadic said.

Pro-Russian Nikolic

His main opponent, Nikolic, the acting head and presidential candidate of the Serbian Radical Party, has taken a widely divergent view in the past, commenting in Serbian parliament that he would prefer Serbia to be a Russian province than an EU member.

In this campaign, however, Nikolic has sought to distance himself from his previous hard-line rhetoric, saying he wants Serbia to be a "link between the West and the East" and promoting a foreign policy of "cooperation not concessions."

But he has made his view on the EU's support for Kosovo independence clear, stating in a recent interview with the AFP news agency that Serbia should not join the EU as long as it is being "conditioned and humiliated" by Brussels over Kosovo.

The majority ethnic-Albanian province has been administered by the United Nations since a NATO air war in 1999 ended a Serbian crackdown on ethnic Albanians, including separatist rebels.

Kosovo politicians, elected in December, said they intend to declare independence unilaterally soon. But the United States and European Union have pressured them to wait until after the Serbian election before making any announcement.

Once independence is proclaimed, the EU plans to send a mission to replace the UN.

Election failing to capture voter attention

Voters have failed to realize the upcoming elections are basically a referendum for or against Europe, according to Serbian market and media researcher Srdjan Bogosavljevic,

"Serbia's citizens haven't yet realized how opposing the attitudes of the two favorites are," Bogosavljevic said. "If there happens to be a change in power, then we will find ourselves in a complete reversal of direction."

Austrian Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik said just days before the election that Serbia was "at a crossroads."

"In this Sunday's presidential elections, Serbia's population has a choice -- to continue along the path of European convergence or to cut itself off from the rest of Europe," she added.