Kroatië begint met coalitiegesprekken (en)
Coalition talks are on the way to form a government in Croatia, after the ruling conservative HDZ party and the opposition centre-left SDP came in neck-and-neck in Sunday's (25 November) parliamentary elections.
Current prime minister Ivo Sanader's HDZ got 61 seats, and Zoran Milanovic's SDP 56, near-final results showed on Tuesday (27 November). The turnout of the elections was around 64 percent.
However, 77 seats would be needed to form a government, which means both parties still have a chance of forming a governing coalition.
And given the tight margin between the two big parties, coalition talks will be crucial.
The liberal HNS (Croatian People's Party) and IDS (Istrian Democratic Assembly), as well as the Bosnian Muslim minority representative - getting 11 seats in total - have said they would back the SDP, bringing its seats to 67, AFP writes.
It is not clear yet whom the other smaller parties will back.
The Croatian parliament can have up to 160 seats distributed as follows: 140 regular deputies, eight guaranteed for the minorities and up to 12 seats decided by Croatians living abroad, depending on the turnout.
A total of 4.4 million people were eligible to vote in these elections, including more than 400,000 living abroad, especially in Bosnia and Herzegovina - but in 52 other countries as well.
The vote of the numerous Croatian diaspora was an important topic during the pre-electoral campaign. The SDP argued that only those living in the country should have the right to decide its future, while the HDZ defended the opposite position and campaigned hard in Bosnia, where it has traditionally high support.
The government that emerges is likely to lead Croatia into the EU - something Zagreb hopes to achieve by 2010.
Regardless of their political differences, both the HDZ and the SDP have said they would work for the country's Euro-Atlantic integration.
EU membership remains popular among Croatians, but around one-third of them still oppose it, according to a poll by Promocija Plus published on Monday (26 November).
While half of the 1,300 people asked (49.8 percent) said they support Croatia's EU accession, 38.6 percent said they opposed it.
Zagreb started EU membership talks in October 2005 and negotiations on fourteen out of its 35 accession package chapters have been opened so far.
The country is also to receive an invitation to join NATO in April 2008.