Word: serbia
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Milosevic, the leader of the Socialist Party of Serbia (formerly the Communist Party), used a surge of Serbian nationalism in late 1980s to come to power. Since then he has been the president of Serbia and then of the new Yugoslavia, which consists of Serbia and the much smaller republic of Montenegro. His popularity has been declining throughout the 1990s, hitting all-time lows last year after the defeat in the Kosovo conflict. He now has the support of only 20 to 25 percent of the population...
...Montenegro decided to boycott the elections despite U.S. diplomatic pressure, and the Serbian opposition again failed to unite. The largest opposition party, the Serbian Renewal Movement, decided to nominate their own presidential candidate, while the other major opposition parties came together under the name of the Democratic Opposition of Serbia (DOS). What Milosevic failed to predict was that DOS would grow exponentially in strength and that it would produce a worthy opponent to Milosevic himself, Dr. Vojislav Kostunica...
...disintegration of Yugoslavia is not over yet. Eleven years of misrule and military adventurism by Slobodan Milosevic have whittled Serbia's partners in the federation down to one: Montenegro, a slice of mountainous, sun-bleached rock and 680,000 inhabitants wedged between the Serbian homeland and the limpid green waters of the Adriatic Sea. Since NATO jets bombed Milosevic out of Kosovo last year, Montenegro has been accelerating its tentative steps toward independence. But it has acted with the knowledge that the Serbian President could slam the door if he genuinely sensed his power base slipping. Now, with Milosevic facing...
Still, ethnic divisions in Montenegro do not run so deep as they do elsewhere in the former Yugoslavia. Montenegrins, unlike Croats and Kosovo Albanians, are ethnically similar to Serbs. Support for outright independence from Serbia among ordinary Montenegrins is mixed: about 35% are for it at any cost, while a much larger proportion--including members of Montenegrin President Milo Djukanovic's ruling party--say they would prefer continued ties with Serbia, but under a different regime. "Time is on the side of a democratic Montenegro," says a Djukanovic ally, Save Paraca, mayor of Cetinje, the traditional heartland of Montenegrin nationalism...
...rule from Belgrade, and even the idea doing the rounds in NATO circles of Djukanovic himself challenging Milosevic for the Yugoslav presidency is likely to be a non-starter - Belgrade's mooted anti-terrorism law would make the Montenegrin leader liable for arrest if he tried to campaign in Serbia. But rejecting the constitutional changes and pressing on toward independence, as many of his supporters want Djukanovic to do, would demand that the Montenegrin government prevent Yugoslavia's presidential elections from taking place on its soil. And that would give Milosevic a pretext to send in his army - right...