The UN war crimes tribunal today said preliminary results of blood tests showed no indication Slobodan Milosevic's death last week was caused by poisoning.
Judge Fausto Pocar, president of the tribunal in The Hague stressed the results were provisional.
The former Yugoslav president, who suffered from a heart condition and high blood pressure, was found dead in his cell on Saturday, just months before an expected verdict in his war crimes trial.A preliminary autopsy report said the cause of death was a heart attack.
Mr Milosevic, who died in jail last Saturday just months before a verdict in his war crimes trial, had suffered from high blood pressure and a heart condition.
It was confirmed that traces of rifampicin - a leprosy and tuberculosis drug that would have neutralised Mr Milosevic's medication for his health conditions - was found in an earlier January 12th blood test.
But Mr Pocar said no traces of the drug rifampicin were found at the time of Mr Milosevic's death. There was evidence of his prescribed medication, but not in toxic concentrations, he added.
In a preliminary autopsy report, pathologists said Mr Milosevic died of a myocardial infarction, or heart attack, that could be explained by two heart conditions he suffered from.
The court had denied an earlier request in December by Mr Milosevic to travel to Russia for heart treatment, and in a letter addressed to Moscow the day before he died, Milosevic said he suspected he was being poisoned with drugs for leprosy and tuberculosis.
Groningen University toxicologist Donald Uges - one of the experts who conducted the January blood tests - said earlier this week he thought Mr Milosevic had knowingly taken harmful medicines to improve his case for going for medical treatment to Russia, where his wife, son and brother live.
The former Serbian leader's body, which was flown to Belgrade earlier this week, is was put on view in the capital yesterday ahead of a private weekend burial in his home town of Pozarevac.
The man branded the "Butcher of the Balkans" had been on trial for four years charged with 66 counts of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes involving conflicts in Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo that tore Yugoslavia apart in the 1990s.