EU pact offer muddies Serbia pre-election waters Tue Jan 29, 2008 12:00pm EST By Ellie Tzortzi - Analysis BELGRADE (Reuters) - A vague European Union pact offered to Serbia in the hope of influencing this weekend's presidential election is more likely to confuse than swing the vote for the EU's preferred man, analysts say. Serbia's pro-Western President Boris Tadic faces nationalist challenger Tomislav Nikolic on Sunday in a tight vote that would decide Serbia's attitude to the world as it faces an imminent, Western-backed independence declaration by its Kosovo province. "This makes practically no difference because Tadic voters are pro-European anyway, and Nikolic voters are not even thinking about this," said analyst Aleksandar Vasovic. "It's only confusing to the average undecided voter, because the message is not clear." The EU, appealing to Serbs to vote for a European future, invited Belgrade on Monday to sign an interim political accord on February7, days after the decisive poll. The 27 EU foreign ministers were unable to agree on signing a full Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA) with Serbia as the Netherlands insisted it must first show full cooperation with the U.N. war crimes tribunal on the former Yugoslavia. Instead they agreed to sign an interim political agreement on cooperation covering free trade, visa liberalization and educational exchanges. EU officials and Tadic's party colleagues such as Foreign Minister Vuk Jeremic hailed the pact as a "breakthrough" that would "open up doors for Serbia". But it fell flat in Serbia, where media and politicians had for weeks taken the SAA signing for granted. More column inches were dedicated to the distribution of free shares and star tennis player Novak Djokovic. Analyst Djordje Vukadinovic said the offer may "just be enough" to help Tadic win. But not only had Serbia not signed the SAA, even the new pact was conditioned to after the vote. "The carrots are getting smaller and more distant," he told Beta news agency. LIFELINE Pollster Marko Blagojevic said it would be hard to tell what effect this "surrogate" agreement would have on the vote. "People were promised the SAA will be signed, I don't know how they will read this interim pact," Blagojevic said. "This is a step to Europe, but not as big as Serbia had hoped for." The EU, which is due to take over supervision of Kosovo in coming weeks as a prelude to recognizing the breakaway province, has made no secret of its conviction that Tadic is the only man to prevent a nationalist backlash over the territory's loss. Belgrade lost control over Kosovo in 1999, when NATO expelled Serb forces to stop the killings of ethnic Albanian civilians in a counter-insurgency war. Most Serbs see it as the nation's heartland and find a breakaway unacceptable. Aware of the emotional pull of the issue, Brussels has tried to dispel the impression of meddling, fearful of making Tadic look like a puppet or leaving him open to charges of treason. But comments by EU ministers that the accord would not be signed on February 7 if Nikolic was the winner, left no doubt that the offer came with strings attached. "A lot of people are turned off by this blatant meddling," said James Lyon, senior Balkans adviser for the International Crisis Group. "The EU saw this as throwing Tadic a lifeline, but they could well be throwing him a lead lifejacket." (Additional reporting by Ivana Sekularac)
