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This is The World, a co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI and 
WGBH in Boston.I am Lisa Mullins. Eight days after Yugoslavs voted 
for President, the power struggle in Belgrade is only intensifying. 
Today President Slobodan Milosevic appeared on TV to affirm that there 
will be a second round of elections and to accuse his critics of selling 
out to the west. While Milosevic has the state controlled media to 
back him up, Vojislav Kostunica seems to have the majority of Serbs 
behind him. Today demonstrators continued to demand that Milosevic 
step down and Kostunica step up. Our coverage begins with the latest 
from The World's Jennifer Glass in Yugoslavia. This morning opposition 
supporters in Belgrade said they would do whatever it takes to make 
Vojislav Kostunica President. We are going to be persistent in our 
demands to prove that Mr. Kostunica has won this presidential elections 
and that we won't give up our demands. Well we here are looking at 
all in the city, I hope that during the day we will be looking at 
the whole city, Belgrade and also in Soviet. They didn't quite do 
that but demonstrators did disrupt traffic in Belgrade and trash collectors 
and public transport workers blocked streets forcing commuters to 
walk to work. Protesters also blocked the main rail line from the 
capital to the coast. And today more coal miners joined the general 
strike. Tusca Antasiaovich of Belgrade's Ramiye newspaper says the 
shutdown of the Colobora mine in particular could provoke trouble 
with the police. The miners they have responded to the appeal by the 
allied opposition and began striking. And because this mine is very, 
very crucial for the electricity production the country, we've heard 
that significant police forces mounting around the mines still at 
a safe distance and still not disturbing the miners. But apparently 
we may expect further confrontation in that area. To counter Kostunica's 
supporters Milosevic is using one of the few weapons still under his 
control - state run television. Today he used the medium to address 
the Serbian people and to attack his opponents. At this moment, ahead 
of the second round of presidential elections, because of the doubts 
that the Democratic opposition of Serbia has in its ability to achieve 
a result which it needs, members of the top Serbian leadership with 
money brought into the country have been bribing, blackmailing and 
intimidating citizens and are now organizing strikes, unrest and violence 
in order to stop production and all industrial activity. Nationalism 
was a key theme as Milosevic attacked the west for last year's Nato 
bombing and for what he called Nato's puppet regime in Kosovo. Western 
nations, he said, are to blame for unrest in the region. They do not 
want peace and prosperity in the Balkans. They want this to be a zone 
of constant conflicts which would give them an alibi for a permanent 
presence here. A puppet regime guarantees violence, potentially many 
years of war. This regime would bring anything but peace. Only our 
policy guarantees peace . That could be a veiled threat that if Milosevic 
loses he will fight with whatever forces he can still command. The 
speech could also be laying the groundwork for President Milosevic 
to declare a state of Emergency, another way he could hold on to power. 
For The World I'm Jennifer Glass in Podgorica, Yugoslavia. Meanwhile, 
Russia today resisted Western pressure to get Milosevic to concede 
defeat. Vladimir Putin said he is willing to receive Milosevic and 
Kostunica in Moscow to quote 'discuss ways of resolving the situation.' 
But then the Russian President took off for a four-day visit to India, 
suggesting no meeting is likely before the run off vote. The World's 
Nenad Chebeck is in Moscow now. How do you read the signals from Moscow, 
Nenad? One the one hand, we have heard statements prior to today with 
Moscow recognizing Kostunica as the rightful President and now we 
are hearing more critical statements. What do you read them as? Well, 
judging by what we heard Putin said that he wanted to see the two 
candidates for the second round of elections. So in an oblique way 
Putin has actually not taken Milosevic's side but he has sort of recognized 
the fact that there will be a second round of elections for the Presidency 
of Yugoslavia, which is far from what either of the Serbian opposition 
leaders wanted to hear or from what the Western leaders wanted to 
hear. They wanted to hear explicit support from Moscow for Kostunica 
that's not coming. The question is why it is not coming? And I wonder 
if you can call on some of your years of reporting out of Belgrade 
as well, including during the NATO bombing. At that time of course 
we heard that line that Russia and Serbia are traditional allies. 
But I wonder if that has changed and we are seeing the evidence of 
that change now. Well, Russia and Serbia do have some historical ties. 
They have the same common, orthodox faith. But Russia has never in 
any decisive moment actually stood by Serbia and helped it. So in 
a way although these traditional ties are there, Russia has never 
actually risked its reputation or its standing to stand by Milosevic's 
side or by the side of Serbia as a state. So then why is it important 
who Moscow supports in this election? Well, it's very important because 
Russia is seen as a decisive factor who could sort of possibly try 
and mediate in this crisis and somehow persuade Milosevic to leave. 
But Russia is trying to sort of back off and not take a very decisive 
stand for a couple of reasons. First of all, it does want to be an 
important player on one side but on the other hand it's got to offer 
something to Milosevic if it wants to sort of use him to sort of step 
down. The West is not helping by insisting on a War Crimes trial for 
Milosevic. So Russia sort of needs to look carefully at sort of what 
it can actually offer to Milosevic, some kind of a carrot. And there 
is no carrot which seems to be on the plate at the moment. There is 
indeed pressure coming from Washington. Can you tell us about some 
of the high level contact that's been made between Washington and 
Moscow? Well, last weekend President Clinton phoned Russia's President 
Vladimir Putin and they spoke about the crisis in Yugoslavia. From 
what we hear from the White House President Clinton was very anxious 
to hear some very decisive words of support for Kostunica and indeed 
in that conversation President Putin did sort of take that kind of 
a line. But today's statement before he left for India by President 
Putin definitely is not what Washington was anxious to hear. Do we 
know what Moscow makes of Milosevic and what it thinks of Kostunica, 
the opponent? Moscow is taking a sort of wait and see kind of an attitude. 
On the one hand it does recognize that Milosevic is a man of the past. 
For example we had last night the Head of the powerful Russian Security 
Council who said that Belgrade needs a President who is recognized 
by the world but certainly not Milosevic. On the other hand what Russia 
fears is that whilst with Milosevic it does have some leverage, if 
Kostunica came into power they might see the same kind of thing that 
they have seen in Hungary, in Poland, in the Czech Republic, in all 
the other Eastern block countries who once they've freed themselves 
from Russian control have taken a decisively pro-western attitude 
and indeed some of them have become members of NATO. Russia feels 
as if Yugoslavia, its sort of almost only ally it's got in that part 
of Europe, and it feels that it has more leverage over Milosevic than 
it might have over Kostunica. I don't think they'll be sorry to see 
Milosevic go but at this stage they are still not prepared to put 
their weight behind any one of the two candidates. Speaking to us 
from Moscow, The World's Nenad Chebeck..