PRISTINA (Kosovo), October 7 (SeeNews) – Kosovo's opposition parties Self-Determination Movement (VV) and Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK) are neck-to-neck after the early general election held on October 6, having won close to a quarter of the votes each, preliminary results showed on Monday.
With 96.98% of the ballots counted, VV is leading with 25.70% of the votes, followed by LDK with 24.99%, according to data released by the Central Election Commission.
The governing Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK) came in third with 21.12% voter support and a two-party alliance led by the former prime minister Ramush Haradinaj’s Alliance for the Future of Kosovo (AAK) followed with 11.59%.
The ethnic Serb party Serb List is fifth withn 6.40% of the votes.
After the early results were announced, the leader of PDK party Kadri Veseli, part of the coalition government led by Haradinaj, said that the party will go into opposition.
VV and LDK are expected to join forces to form Kosovo's new coalition government, according to local media reports. The future government needs to be endorsed by at least 61 members of Kosovo's 120-seat parliament.
Haradinaj stepped down in July after he was summoned to appear for questioning as suspect before the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague. The institution is investigating crimes committed during the 1990s guerrilla war waged by Kosovo's ethnic Albanians against Serbia's government forces.
Before the election, LDK and VV both declared they would not enter into a government coalition with PDK.