Serbs voted Sunday in a closely-contested parliamentary election between pro-Western democrats and ultranationalists to determine whether the troubled Balkan nation drifts toward mainstream Europe or returns to its wartime nationalist past, according to The Associated Press. The vote was the first since the breakup of Serbia's union last year with Montenegro, its last partner from the former Yugoslavia that split up in wartime campaigns conducted under late Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic in the 1990s. Turnout was 56.7 percent an hour before polls closed at 1900 GMT, said CeSID, an independent Serbian polling group, showing strong interest among the 6.6 million strong electorate. Parties must receive a minimum 5 percent of the vote to enter the 250-member parliament. Shortly after the vote, a U.N. plan for the future of Serbia's breakaway Kosovo province is expected to be published.
