Serbian president Boris Tadic is likely to name Serbia's next prime minister very soon, Beta news agency reported on June 24, as quoted by Serbian broadcaster B92. According to the agency's sources, the two main candidates were outgoing Serbian foreign minister Vuk Jeremic and outgoing finance minister Mirko Cvetkovic, both from Tadic's Democratic Party (DS), with Jeremic credited as having the bigger chances to get the job.

Tadic will decide on who to nominate at a DS presidency meeting that is set to discuss the cabinet appointments, Beta quoted its sources as saying.

Elections in Serbia were held on May 11, following a severe crisis in the former Serbian government over whether to continue with the country's European Union integration or to cut ties with the bloc given that most of its members recognised the independence of the secessionist Serbian province of Kosovo.

The pro-European coalition headed by the DS won the most seats but did not manage to secure itself a majority in the 250-seat Serbian parliament. The nationalist Serbian Radical Party (SRS) and Democratic Party of Serbia-New Serbia (DSS-NS) came second and third, respectively, and although they agreed on joining forces to form a government, they still needed a partner to get them over the 126-seat threshold.

Therefore both sides turned to the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS)-led coalition, which emerged as the kingmaker for the future cabinet with the twenty seats it managed to win at the elections. The Socialists initially started talks with the nationalist bloc, but made little headway since the party is still in favour of closer ties with the West, which made them turn to the DS.

Negotiations between the SPS and the Democrats on the formation of a new cabinet officially started on June 21 and on June 23 the executive board of the SPS approved forming a coalition with Tadic, website Balkan Insight reported. What remained was the sorting out of the appointments.

Meanwhile the Liberal Democratic Party also decided to join the forming coalition.

The June 24 session of the Serbian parliament is expected to elect a parliamentary speaker, who, reports claim, will be SPS deputy head Slavica Đukic-Dejanovic.

Expectations are that the new Serbian cabinet will be named on June 26.