SERB opposition leaders were sceptical last night that President Slobodan Milosevic would respond positively to a report from the Organisation of Security and Co operation in Europe (OSCE), which backed claims that the opposition was robbed of local election victories.
Earlier the former Spanish prime minister, Mr Felipe Gonzalez, representing the OSCE commission, urged President Milosevic to install "real democracy and respect opposition victories in recent local elections.
"We do not expect him [Milosevic] to accept the findings of this commission. We expect further escalation, aggravation of this political crisis," said Mr Zoran Djindjic, leader of the opposition Democratic Party.
The Yugoslav Foreign Minister, Mr Milan Milutinovic, said the OSCE delegation had delivered a "balanced" report, but had confused some facts when it visited Belgrade last weekend.
However, neither Mr Milutinovic nor the state media mentioned the recommendation of Mr Gonzalez that the election results should be restored.
Mr Milutinovic said the most important feature of the report was that it called for dialogue "within the framework of the system" and "discussion between the authorities and the opposition in parliament".
"We accept the suggestions as well intentioned and constructive because they urged that everything should be considered within the institutions of our system."
Mr Milosevic had invited the mission to Belgrade after the allegations of electoral fraud brought about weeks of opposition street protests.
Mr Gonzalez said in the report that he concluded that the anti Milosevic Zajedno coalition had fairly won the local polls in 13 key disputed provincial centres as well as in Belgrade's municipalities.
He said the reasons given by Serbian courts for annulling the opposition victories were based on arguments "that no democratic country could have accepted".
Mr Milutinovic said the OSCE mission had confused several facts including the number of disputed districts, but the mix-up was understandable "because naturally the delegation could not go through everything in 24 hours".
Weeks of peaceful processions through the centre of Belgrade ended on Thursday when police equipped with body armour, helmets, shields and truncheons cleared the streets and forced demonstrators back into a pedestrian square.
Police also curtailed yesterday's celebrations, preventing students from marching through the streets. Instead the protesters walked in circles pretending to be prisoners.
The students blew trumpets and whistles and chanted anti Milosevic slogans under the impassive gaze of ranks of riot police, as people began arriving for the main opposition demonstration.
Students and members of Belgrade's disaffected middle class, who have turned out daily in their tens of thousands for the marches, are keen to avoid conflict with the police.
Clashes on Tuesday, when pro and anti Milosevic factions fought running skirmishes in the capital before police waded in to break them up, left at least 58 injured.
The opposition is putting its faith in peaceful protest and international pressure on Mr Milosevic, who needs access to lines of international credit to rescue Yugoslavia's economy, still foundering after years of wartime sanctions.
"If it were not for this peaceful resistance to the theft of our votes, the OSCE would never have been invited and it would never have had the chance to confirm our election victory," opposition leader Mr Vuk Draskovic told yesterday's crowd.
Western powers, which spent much of 1996 praising Mr Milosevic for his role in helping to broker and implement a Bosnian peace deal, have now rounded on the Serbian President, lambasting his anti democratic grip on power.
The United States, Britain, France and Italy have criticised Mr Milosevic and the SPS. "We continue to hold Milosevic responsible for any violence which may occur," a US State Department spokesman said in Washington on Thursday.