EU hopeful Croatia votes to elect president

Croatians are choosing a successor to popular centrist Stipe Mesic, who stands down after serving the maximum two five-year terms.

Croatians went to the polls on Sunday amid a deepening economic crisis and concerns over high-level corruption to elect a president to steer the Balkans country into the European Union.

Croatians are choosing a successor to popular centrist Stipe Mesic, who stands down in February after serving the maximum two five-year terms and successfully transforming the country from a nationalist autocracy into a parliamentary democracy.

While Mesic, 75, succeeded in gaining Croatia's entry into the NATO military alliance earlier this year, the country's EU ambitions were delayed by a border dispute with neighbouring Slovenia.

The former Yugoslav republic is now unlikely to join the 27-member bloc before 2012, but first must tackle a deepening economic crisis and high-level corruption.

Winner will be decided in a run-off

The opinion polls show that the winner will be decided in a run-off with none of the 12 candidates likely to secure more than 50 percent support needed for an outright victory.

Ivo Josipovic of the main opposition Social Democrats (SDP) is virtually assured a place in the run-off as polls give him an average lead of 15 percentage points over his opponents.

The 52-year-old legal expert and classical music composer, who has an untarnished political career but lacks political charisma, is likely to face either controversial Zagreb mayor Milan Bandic or businessman Nadan Vidosevic.

Polls suggest a neck-and-neck race between the populist Bandic, 54, a former veteran SDP member, and Vidosevic, 49, a former member of the ruling conservative Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) who has headed the Croatian Chamber of Commerce since 1995.

Concerns over the economy, which is set to contract by more than five percent this year as experts warn the crisis is likely to worsen in 2010, could play to Vidosevic's advantage.

Eradicating high-level corruption, a long-standing concern of EU, was also a top campaign issue.

Brussels recently warned that although anti-corruption efforts in Croatia were producing initial results "corruption remains prevalent in many areas and tools are not being deployed with sufficient vigour, especially on political corruption."

Over the past few months, Zagreb has launched several corruption probes in state-run companies which are perceived here as hotbeds of corruption, while some dozen officials were detained.

In an unprecedented move, Vice Prime Minister Damir Polancec resigned in October after media reports linked him to a major corruption scandal.

Polling stations opened at 7:00 am

Analysts say that Jadranka Kosor taking over as prime minister at the head of the conservative HDZ government in July also contributed to the corruption crackdown.

Candidates haven't escaped the taint of corruption either, with independent media criticising Bandic's alleged links with corruption in the capital and Vidosevic facing questions about the origins of his wealth.

Polling stations for some 4.4 million eligible voters, including more than 400,000 living abroad, mostly in neighbouring Bosnia, opened at 7:00 am (0600 GMT).

They are to close 12 hours later while the electoral commission is to announce first results at midnight Sunday (2300 GMT).