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BELGRADE - Dismissed as unfit for government but still Serbia's strongest party, the ultranationalist Radicals say they will settle for another spell in opposition for now, but will soon be back ready for office.
The Radicals won 28 per cent of the vote in yesterday's election but have
no natural partner to give them a majority. The pro-Western Democrats took 23 per cent and are expected to seek a deal with other parties.
"It is hard when you're the best but you're not in power," Radicals' deputy leader Tomislav Nikolic said in an interview.
"We won 1,160,000 votes, we defeated the party of the Serbian president and the party of the Serbian Prime Minister. But it's still understood as a warning from the West that the so-called 'democratic forces' have to form the government."
Nikolic said the pro-Western parties would have a hard time forming a coalition and forecast that it would be short-lived.
"We'll have elections by the end of the year," he said.
He said Democrat leader President Boris Tadic and Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica would likely form a coalition under pressure from the West but there were too many differences for them to work together well.
As soon as the West presented a plan expected to grant independence to the Albanian majority in Serbia's breakaway Kosovo province, Tadic and Kostunica would fall out over how to react, he said.
Tadic has told Serbs that Kosovo, run by the United Nations since NATO drove out the forces of the late autocrat Slobodan Milosevic in 1999, may already be lost.
Kostunica echoes nationalist rhetoric that the land Serbs consider the cradle of their nation cannot ever be conceded.
Nikolic denied that Radicals preferred being in opposition. "We don't fear the responsibility. But we don't have a coalition partner. We accuse the others of serious crimes, some of them even treason. How can we form a government with them?" he said.
Great success
The Radicals say Serbia should declare Kosovo "occupied" if the West grants independence. They would also refuse to arrest top war crimes fugitive Ratko Mladic, charged with genocide in Bosnia, and send him to the UN war crimes tribunal, because they consider him a hero.
The EU froze talks with Serbia eight months ago because of its failure to capture Mladic. The Radicals say Brussels will back down and talk to Serbia if it stands firm.
True to the dream of their leader Vojislav Seselj, himself on trial at The Hague on war crimes charges, they also hope to one day extend Serb borders to embrace ethnic Serbs in Bosnia and Croatia, justifying the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s.
Nikolic branded as "shameless" Western envoys who warned Serbs last week that chauvinist policies could lead to renewed isolation.
"We don't lose heart," Nikolic said. "Despite all the enmity the West has towards us, all the silent threats that Serbia will face all kinds of problems if the Radicals win, we are achieving great success."
He hoped for a showdown at the next election, possibly in a few months, that would finally give Radicals a clear majority.
"We'll have two opposing blocs and someone will have to have 50 per cent of the votes," Nikolic said. "We'll be very glad to be in power. We know the problems Serbia is facing and we know how to solve them."
- REUTERS