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Sunday, October 29 4:03 AM SGT

Zoran -- the only Serb to vote in Kosovo town

ZVECAN, Yugoslavia, Oct 28 (AFP) -

As a Serb living in Kosovo nowadays, Zoran is used to being in the minority, but
on Saturday he
was in a minority of one.

His wife begged him not to do it. Think of the danger to the rest of the family,
she warned, but Zoran
did not listen. He was determined to vote.

By early afternoon, he was still the only Serb in Zvecan, a town in northern
Kosovo, to have cast a
ballot in Kosovo's municipal elections boycotted by the Serb minority living in
the Yugoslav
province.

"I wanted to show that I am still here and that I want to stay in Kosovo," the
44-year-old father of
two explained.

"My family has been here for 300 years, I do not want to leave," he insisted.

Out of 14 people registered to vote in the predominantly Serb town of Zvecan,
Zoran (not his real
name) was the only one to venture as far as the polling station still decorated
with posters of
Slobodan Milosevic left over from Yugoslavia's September 24 presidential
elections.

Not that Zoran had much of a choice when he did cast his ballot. There was only
one party, the
Alliance for the Future of Kosovo, an ethnic Albanian grouping, putting up
candidates in his
municipality.

"I understand the Serbs who are boycotting the elections, they are afraid of the
Albanians and they
are afraid of losing Kosovo," Zoran explained.

"Personally, I have nothing against the Albanians. Before the war, an Albanian
doctor treated my
parents when they were sick," he said.

Last month, when Zoran voted in the Yugoslav elections, he backed pro-democracy
candidate
Vojislav Kostunica, who ended up defeating Milosevic.

"There is nothing contradictory about taking part in both elections," Zoran
said, although once again
he was in a minority of one when it came to expressing that opinion in Zvecan.

"We have already had our elections. And we are afraid that this vote is the
first step towards the
independence of Kosovo," said Nenon Maric, a Serb official in the town.

Not far away, in the divided town of Kosovska Mitrovica, it was another world.

Election fever gripped one Albanian family as they posed for photographs in
front of a polling station
surrounded by bombed-out buildings from last year's NATO air war.

"We are very satisfied, we have been waiting for this for 10 years," said Hanife
Beka, a woman
dressed in baggy trousers, or dimija, a traditional Albanian costume.

"I voted for Hashim Thaci because he is the only one capable of ethnic
cleansing," said the woman
who, six months ago, was the victim of a grenade attack.

Her sister-in-law, Zymrute Beka, wearing a blue headscarf, had also just cast
her vote, but she was
not sure exactly for whom.

"I cannot read so I just put a circle on the top of the list. The most important
thing today is the
gesture," she insisted.

Next into the booth was Sevdije Vatovic. "I voted for Ibrahim Rugova, the only
one who can unify
the Kosovo people," said this 50-year old woman, whose neighbours are Serbs.

Perhaps she would be able "to go freely" about her business after the election,
she said.

A military escort had accompanied her from the mostly Serb, northern sector of
Mitrovica to the
southern part of town where she was registered to vote.

Waiting in the queue outside the polling station was an old man, another ethnic
Albanian, in very high
spirits.

"I will not sleep tonight because of these elections," he said. "This is the
beginning of independence."