President Slobodan Milosevic shuffled his federal government yesterday, bringing in the opposition leader, Mr Vuk Draskovic, whom he had jailed for subversion in 1993.
Mr Draskovic, the leader of the moderate nationalist Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO) - the only major parliamentary party not yet in the Yugoslav cabinet - was appointed Deputy Prime Minister in charge of international relations.
Two of Mr Draskovic's party colleagues were named to head the ministries of interior trade and information, and a third is to be a minister without portfolio, according to a government statement quoted by the official news agency, Tanjug.
Mr Draskovic, once a harsh critic of Mr Milosevic, is expected to try to use his good relations with Western countries, particularly the US, to improve Yugoslavia's tarnished image abroad, analysts said.
Another key task will be to improve relations between Serbia and Montenegro, the two members of the loosening Yugoslav federation.
Relations between Serbia and its tiny southern neighbour have been strained since Montenegro elected a reformist, western-oriented president just over a year ago.
"We are not entering the federal government to defend the present state of affairs, which is bad, but to accelerate changes which are in the interest of Serbia and Montenegro . . . to reconcile with the international community and to fight for the truth on Kosovo," Mr Draskovic told a local Serbian TV-station.
The SPO's policy on Kosovo is close to that of the ruling Serbian Socialist Party and the ultra-nationalist Serbian Radical Party, seeing the province as the cradle of Serbian culture and therefore inseparable from the rest of the country.
However, unlike other leading political parties, the SPO has strongly criticised Serbia's restrictive media and university laws, and President Milosevic's collision course with the US and NATO.