PRESS RELEASES

Spread of extremism in Western Balkans should be addressed by long-term measures aimed at root causes such as inequality, political corruption and foreign influence, it was highlighted at the presentation of main findings of the Western Balkans Extremism Research Forum Regional Report held on 29 January 2019 in London. BCSP Executive Director Predrag Petrovic presented findings of the Serbia Report that examined drivers of radicalisation and violent extremism in Serbia ...

Belgrade Centre for Security Policy (BCSP) is for the seventh year in a row in company of world’s best think-tanks ranked in the Global Go To Think Tank Index Report! University of Pennsylvania (USA) traditionally publishes the most comprehensive list of leading think-tanks from around the world every year. BCSP is the best ranked think-tank in the Western Balkans covering defence, national security, foreign policy and international relations. In ...

Belgrade Centre for Security Policy Director Sonja Stojanovic Gajic was re-elected as a member of the OSCE Network of Think Tanks and Academic Institutions Steering Committee. The BCSP participated in the establishment of this network in 2013. Besides the BCSP Director, members of the Steering Committee are Irina Chernykh (KISI, Kazakhstan), Barbara Kunz (IFRI, France), Marko Lehti (TAPRI, Finland), Amb Philip McDonagh (Edward M Kennedy Institute for Conflict Intervention, ...

What will the Western Balkans look like in 2025? Will we witness Republika Srpska declare independence, a worsening of relations between Kosovo and Serbia, and the rise of ethnic tensions across the region - or will we celebrate Montenegro and Serbia joining the EU, with good reason to hope that the rest of the region will soon follow? BCSP Researcher Isidora Stakic contributed to the paper “Balkan futures - ...

Under the European Commission’s 2018 Western Balkan strategy, candidate countries from the region must resolve bilateral disputes before joining the EU. As it wants to avoid importing conflicts, the EU puts the onus to ensure good neighbourly relations onto the region itself.

{image1}Improving the narratives of the technical dialogue in both Kosovo and Serbia by highlighting impact of the agreements on the everyday lives of the citizens is the goal of the project “Promoting and Communicating Benefits of the Kosovo-Serbia EU Facilitated Dialogue” launched by Kosovo Serbia Policy Advocacy Group (KSPAG). The project foresees a number of communication and outreach activities which will disseminate and promote the benefits of the technical ...

  Dear friends and partners, BCSP wishes you a safe and sound year 2019! We promise that we will contribute to this through #BREAKINGFEAR that is becoming increasingly important in the era of intimidation of citizens by portraying as a threat those who think differently, neighbours from the region, conflicts of great powers and so-called new threats. As always, the response from the BCSP will be based on research ...

Academic Event at this year’s BSF was dedicated to answering the question how conflict-sensitive is the EU crisis response. Participants concluded that the EU shifted to a more pragmatic approach and improved its crisis response capacities, but that it needs to learn from both successes and failures more quickly. It was agreed that the local has to be included on different levels, but with re-examining what ’local’ means. “The ...

It is necessary to perceive citizens as allies, and actively involve them in budget planning in order to fulfil their security needs - this was highlighted at the event organized by Belgrade Centre for Security Policy (BCSP) in Nis, on December 18th 2018. Opening the panel discussion, BCSP Researcher Sasa Djordjevic emphasized that the budget for 2019 was adopted without a proper debate in the Assembly, and that that ...

Journal of Regional Security (JRS), founded by BCSP among others, in the new categorization of the Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development of the Republic of Serbia was assigned the M24 category, which is in the same range as the best international journals. Only two journals in the broader category Political sciences can be assigned this category. Since 2018 JRS can be found in databases Serbian Citation Index, ...

Confidence in the police in Serbia is growing, as well as the perception of corruption and the impression that the work of the police has been politicized, it was shown in the public opinion survey results presented by the POINTPULSE network and Belgrade Centre for Security Policy (BCSP) on November 6, 2018, in Belgrade. According to the research, six out of ten citizens in Serbia trust the police, which is ...

{image1} The new normal requires that the EU changes its approach to the Balkans and identifies problems concerning the rule of law and democracy, but also that the Balkans change its approach to the EU, it was concluded at the eight Belgrade Security Forum (BSF) held on 17-19 October 2018. Politicians alone are not going to tackle corruption because of their vested interest in nurturing kleptocratic networks; citizens and ...