Thousands of mourners were due Friday to pay homage to slain foreign minister Anna Lindh as police broadened their hunt for a man who shocked Sweden by stabbing to death one of its most popular figures.

Meanwhile contrasting opinion polls kept Swedes guessing as to whether the slaying of Lindh, who was an ardent supporter of adopting the euro, may sway the outcome of a key currency referendum Sunday that carries wide-ranging repercussions for Europe.

Led by Swedish Prime Minister Goeran Persson, the demonstration on Sergels Torg square has been called "A Protest Against Violence and For Democracy", with a similar gathering also scheduled in Sweden's second city of Gothenburg.

The second day of mourning over Lindh's death followed a night on which throngs of stunned Stockholmers held candle-light vigils and lay beds of roses at spontaneous memorial sites that sprung up in the city.

The 46-year-old mother of two succumbed to massive internal bleeding caused by a damaged liver on Thursday morning.

Television news coverage was consumed with interviews of ordinary citizens who often looked too shattered by Lindh's fatal stabbing at an upmarket department store Wednesday to string together more than a few words.

"Sweden has lost one of its most important representatives, our face to the world," Persson said in a televised broadcast to the Swedish nation Thursday evening.

"The country is in shock and plunged into sadness," Persson said.

But he added that a hotly contested referendum on whether to adopt the euro as the country's currency would go ahead Sunday as planned.

A poll released Friday by the Skop research institute and conducted after Lindh's death showed that although most Swedes had opposed the euro before, the "yes" and "no" camps were now running neck-and-neck.

Some economists suggested this was an emotional breaking point linked to Lindh's slaying and that "yes" would prevail Sunday.

But a second opinion poll published Friday conducted by Sifo for the TT news agency showed the "no" vote has kept its lead since Lindh's death.

"The truth is probably somewhere in-between the two," said Steve Barrow, an economist following the Swedish euro campaign for Bear Stearns investment bank in London.

"But 'in-between', in this case, still means 'No'," he said.

And the "no" camp showed few signs of letting up their cause as colorful orange and blue posters popped up across Stockholm urging people to "vote for democracy and against the euro."

One anti-euro poster showed a caricature of the Swedish queen panhandling for money while wearing a sign reading simply: "Unemployed."

Yet the nation appeared Friday still too stunned by Lindh's murder to focus on the euro vote.

A hunt for the attacker has so far borne no fruit. Police announced Friday they had released a 32-year-old man -- initially seen as the prime suspect -- after questioning him in connection with the attack and now were broadening their desperate search to include homeless shelters.

And with emotions running high, officials were unable Friday to say when Lindh may be laid to rest.

Burial ceremonies customarily take up to a week to perform in Sweden and some speculated that with invitations for foreign dignitaries still to come, it may be a while before Lindh is laid to rest.

Lindh was a heavyweight on Sweden's political scene who had been tipped to succeed Persson as prime minister.

A member of Sweden's ruling Social Democratic party, Lindh became foreign minister in 1998. She was voted the fourth-most admired woman in Sweden in a recent survey.