Deputies discussed the draft of a new resolution on Kosovo in which the outgoing government suggests rejecting the plan for the province's final status proposed by UN special envoy Martti Ahtisaari.
The first session was chaired by the oldest deputy in the new parliament, Borka Vucic, publicly known as the most reliable banker of the late Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic, who was accused of war crimes.
In attendance were President Boris Tadic, outgoing Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica and his ministers as well as members of Serbia's negotiating team for Kosovo.
The Serbian Radical Party, whose deputies attended the session in T-shirts with the image of their leader, war crimes indictee Vojislav Seselj, is the strongest party in parliament, with 81 of a total of 250 seats.
Tadic's Democratic Party has 64 seats, the coalition of Kostunica's Democratic Party of Serbia and Velimir Ilic's New Serbia has 46 seats, Mladjan Dinkic's G17 Plus and the late Milosevic's Socialist Party have 16 seats each, while the coalition of Cedomir Jovanovic's Liberal Democratic Party, Natasa Micic's Civic Alliance of Serbia, Zarko Korac's Social Democratic Union and Nenad Canak's Social Democratic League of Vojvodina has 15 seats.
Of minorities' parties, Sulejman Ugljanin's List for Sandzak (i.e. Bosniak minority) has two seats, the Alliance of Vojvodina Hungarians has three seats, while the Roma Union of Serbia, the Roma Party and the Coalition of Presevo Valley Albanians each have one seat.
The constituting of the new parliament marks the start of a three-month deadline for the formation of the new government. If this does not happen, the Assembly will be dissolved and new elections called.