Milosevic Reportedly Rejects Russia’s Offer to Mediate

Preparing to face down the opposition in the streets, Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic on Saturday turned down an offer of Russian mediation, a U.S. official said. The defiant Milosevic declared that Yugoslavs themselves “will decide our fate.”

Milosevic spoke as the opposition unveiled plans for what they hope will be nationwide work stoppages and blockades to force the Yugoslav president to accept defeat by challenger Vojislav Kostunica in the Sept. 24 elections.

The opposition claims that Kostunica won outright, but the government insists that he failed to garner enough votes to avoid a runoff next Sunday. The Federal Electoral Commission on Saturday formally rejected all opposition challenges of alleged vote irregularities.

Russian President Vladimir V. Putin offered Saturday to send his foreign minister, Igor S. Ivanov, to Belgrade--the Yugoslav and Serbian capital--to try to defuse the showdown. U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, however, said the Russians should accept Milosevic’s apparent defeat.

The only message Moscow should send, she said en route to meetings in Europe, was that the Yugoslav president is “finished.”

President Clinton reinforced that point later Saturday in a half-hour telephone conversation with Putin.

According to P.J. Crowley, the spokesman for the National Security Council, Putin told Clinton that his offer to send Ivanov to meet both Milosevic and Kostunica had been rejected.

There was no official statement from the Yugoslav government on whether Milosevic had rejected the Russian offer. But in a speech Saturday to the Yugoslav military academy, Milosevic said: “We alone will decide our fate.”

The president, who addressed the graduation ceremony at the military academy, congratulated the newly commissioned officers for serving “at a time of great temptation for our people and state.”

In his first public appearance since last weekend’s elections, Milosevic reminded the military of its duty to defend “our freedom and the independence of our country,” which the government claims is at risk because of alleged Western interference in the elections.

Thousands of opposition supporters gathered in Belgrade on Saturday night to hear their leaders announce a general strike for Monday and a limited road blockade today as a “dress rehearsal.”

Truckers, farmers and workers blocked several roads in parts of Serbia on Saturday, some for only several hours as a warning of a broader blockade Monday.

Various professional groups have pledged to support the opposition, and university and high school students have announced that they will join the general strike.