Nationalist hardliner Tomislav Nikolic has won the first round of Serbia’s presidential race, partial results showed on Monday, but still faces a runoff with incumbent reformist Boris Tadic.

With Sunday’s record turnout of around 60 per cent highlighting public concerns for the future, the electoral commission said its partial results showed Nikolic, who favours closer ties with Russia, on 38.2 per cent, with Tadic, who wants to take Serbia into the European Union, trailing on 35.1 per cent. The result is also considered crucial for the looming declaration of independence by the province of Kosovo.

The second round runoff on February 3 will be a repeat of the 2004 election narrowly won by Tadic.“From tomorrow (Tuesday) morning, we begin our campaign for the runoff, which will be decisive and bring all needed changes to Serbia,” Nikolic told reporters at his party headquarters.

Tadic called on voters to “show that Serbia will not give up its European path,” taken since the fall of late strongman Slobodan Milosevic in 2000.

“I am convinced that the citizens will decide to support the European future,” Tadic told his supporters. The electoral commission estimates were close to those given by the independent Centre for Free Elections and Democracy (CESID) which gave Nikolic 39.4 per cent and Tadic 35.4 per cent. Limited voting went ahead in Kosovo, where the majority ethnic Albanian population has boycotted Serbian elections. There are only about 100,000 Serbs left in a total regional population of about 1.9 million. “The elections in Serbia will have no impact on Kosovo. We have our path,” said PM Hashim Thaci.