Amendments to the Action Plans for Chapters 23 and 24 by the End of the Year

“The EU requires realistic and measurable results, that the law applies equally to all and that all criminals are prosecuted even if they have connections with the authorities,” said BCSP Director and Coordinator of the NCEU Working Group for Chapter 24 Sonja Stojanovic Gajic at the meeting held in Palace of Serbia.

Stojanovic Gajic pointed out at the gathering that the EU in the Enlargement Strategy for the Western Balkans recognized the problem of captured state for the first time, that the links with organized crime and corruption are present at all levels of government and lead to the intertwining of public and private interests in all countries of the Western Balkans. It is therefore necessary to use the revision of the Action Plan not only to comply with the minimum legal standards of the EU, but to eliminate the causes that lead to the perception of impunity and unequal access to justice and security among citizens. For Chapter 24, it is most important to provide measures that would lead to the fulfillment of interim benchmarks on strengthening the integrity of the police with the aim of making it operationally independent of the political influence and criminal influence. Only then will the police be allowed to investigate everything for which there is evidence, rather than selectively acting only when it does not jeopardize the particular interests of politicians and criminal groups.

That the laws are not a complete indicator of progress is also illustrated by the example of the changes to the law on police reform adopted in March this year, stressed Stojanovic Gajic. Although the proclaimed aim of the changes was the professionalization of the police free from the political influence and criminal influence, an exception was made that the Minister can decide on employment without competition and promotion without clear criteria. It is very important to pay attention to areas for which the EU does not have ‘hard’ acquis, such as the standards for professional and responsible police, Stojanovic Gajic warned. In addition, laws can be changed under the mask of reform in order to reduce the attained level of citizens' rights, as in the case of amendments to the Law on Free Access to Information, concluded Stojanovic Gajic.

What are the objectives of the revision of the Action Plan?

Head of the Negotiating Team for Accession of the Republic of Serbia to the European Union Tanja Miscevic said that the action plans for chapters 23 and 24 should be revised by the end of 2018. She pointed out that the current version of the action plan was optimistic because it contains unrealistic deadlines and there is not enough capacity for implementation of activities. Miscevic said that the revised Action Plan for Chapter 24 should be credible and contain realistic plans with the goal of meeting the interim benchmarks that were obtained at the intergovernmental conference in May 2016, when this chapter was opened. She underlined that the revised Action Plan for Chapter 24 would have to wait to be aligned with the changes to the Action Plan for Chapter 23 that are expected to be finished at the end of the year, although it is likely to be done before that.

Miscevic emphasized that Serbia's plan is to meet interim benchmarks by 2021 and to close this chapter two years later. Therefore, in the new National Programme for the Adoption of the Acquis, the deadline for harmonisation with the EU was shifted from 2018 to 2021, taking into account that the negotiation process must be completed two years before the official entry into the EU, for which 2025 was approximately given. Miscevic emphasized that Belgrade's plan is not moving quickly towards the EU at all costs, but that all necessary measures “are available to us as citizens of Serbia.”

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Deputy Head of the Sector for International Cooperation, EU Affairs and Planning at Ministry of InteriorJelena Bujakovic said that more than 50% of the activities from the first Action Plan were met, and that less than 20% was not realized. “There is not one area in Chapter 24 where there is absolutely no progress,” Bujakovic said.

She reminded that a number of regulations have been adopted, such as laws on foreigners, asylum and border control, as well as strategies, including the Strategy for Prevention and Suppression of Trafficking in Humans and the Strategy for the Prevention and Countering of Terrorism. Bujakovic cited the formation of a new government and the adoption of amendments to the Law on Ministries as one of the reasons for not fulfilling all the activities from the first Action Plan, which is why the proposals of new laws were again referred for opinion. Also, some activities were not carried out because they were supposed to be financed through projects which started late, and in some cases there was no willingness of the other party involved in the implementation of activities, as in the case of the readmission agreement.

In the part of the meeting closed to the public, representatives of civil society organizations had the opportunity to hear about the realized activities from the Action Plan and its amendments from the sub-policy coordinators within Chapter 24 from the Ministry of Interior, the Republic Public Prosecutor's Office, the Ministry of Finance, the Security Information Agency (SIA) and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Customs Administration, as well as to ask questions.

 The themes were judicial cooperation, police cooperation, the fight against organized crime, the fight against drugs, counterfeiting of the euro, customs cooperation, the fight against terrorism, visa policy, migration, asylum, and external borders and Schengen.

At the end of the meeting, it was agreed that the members of the NCEU Working Group submit written proposals to amend the Action Plan by the end of June 2018.

New anti-corruption activities should aim at solving the problem

BCSP researcher Sasa Djordjevic asked a number of questions about integrity and the fight against corruption, arms control and the fight against drugs. Djordjevic pointed out that it is not clear what fundamental changes happened due to the implemented activities in the area of ​​reducing corruption in the border police and pointed to the problematic and unclear management of confiscated property acquired through the commission of criminal offenses.

The measure from the Revised Action Plan for Chapter 24 on the improvement of the fight against corruption at the border is imprecise, BCSP researcher said.

“The deadline, the necessary funds and the source of funding have not been established for the implementation of activities. The indicator of results is imprecise and does not mean anything because it is emphasized, without any explanation, that the results of conducting this activity are consultations with the Anti-Corruption Agency and the improvement of the internal control system,” Djordjevic pointed out.

Activities in the Action Plan for Chapter 24 should represent responses to the corruption risk analysis in the border police, which the Ministry of Interior made last year, concluded Djordjevic.

Assistant Minister of Interior and Head of the Sector for international cooperation, EU affairs and planning Zoran Lazarov said that this is only the first version of the revised Action Plan for Chapter 24 and that there is still more writing to be done, and that it is important to recognize all the imprecisions as soon as possible so that they are corrected.

The question why the Action Plan does not include the regional dimension of small arms control, since the deputy ministers of interior and foreign affairs of the countries in the region signed a joint statement, received an answer that all necessary declarations need to be confirmed first at the London summit.

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BCSP Executive Director Predrag Petrovic pointed to the need for civil society organizations to have up-to-date information on the implementation of the Strategy for the Prevention and Countering of Terrorism.

“It is very important that civil society organizations have access information to base research on, since prevention and determining the drivers of extremism are among the main elements of the strategy. While researching for the Extremism Research Forum – Serbia Report, the BCSP received information from the prosecution about the terrorism defendants that went to Syria, while we did not get data for those who went to fight in Ukraine,” Petrovic said.

Igor Kecojevic (SIA)pointed out that the citizens of Serbia who fought in Ukraine are criminalized and that this problem is in focus, but that it is not being linked to terrorism.