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Serbia has done a lot in Chapter 24, but Strategy for the fight against terrorism is missing

Even though Serbia has done a lot within the field of justice, freedom and security, the much needed political will to make even greater progress in Chapter 24 was missing, pointed up director of the Belgrade Center for Security Policy (BCSP) Sonja Stojanovic Gajic at the meeting that was held on ...

Even though Serbia has done a lot within the field of justice, freedom and security, the much needed political will to make even greater progress in Chapter 24 was missing, pointed up director of the Belgrade Center for Security Policy (BCSP) Sonja Stojanovic Gajic at the meeting that was held on 10th February 2016 in Belgrade.

After opening of Chapter 24 in Serbia’s negotiations with the EU had been opened in July last year, the Working group for this Chapter, led by Ministry of Interior, prepared the first six-month Report on the implementation of the activities from the Action plan for Chapter 24. At the meeting with representatives of the civil society, which was organized by BCSP as the coordinator of the Working group for the Chapter 24 within the National Convention on the EU, key accomplishments as well as the obstacles, challenges and reasons for delaying some of the assignments were discussed.

“A lot has been done, but alongside there have been quite unnecessary oversights.Government and the National Assembly of Serbia failed to follow good work of the state administration. One of the concrete examples is the Strategy for the fight against terrorism and the Action plan, which have been ready for over six months, public discussion was held, civil society and academic community gave their opinions, but the document has not been adopted yet”, stressed Director of the BCSP.

The process of EU integration is a common work of the state and civil society, and rule of law is the most important field for citizens, said the Chief Negotiator for Serbia’s accession negotiations with the EU Tanja Miscevic.

“There is no lack of political will on the subject of reforms of judiciary, fight against the organized crime and corruption. Missing strategies and laws are the priorities within the Chapter 24 at this point. Each law, especially ones from the field of the rule of law, we need to check with the EU institutions and the organizations that deal with those themes. These institutions dealt with other issues, so for instance the migrant crisis took a part of their time. At the same time, the parliamentary elections were held in Serbia, hence all laws that were in the procedure had to be reassessed“, said Miscevic adding that Chapters 20, 26 and 29 might be opened soon.

Representatives of the civil sector also named elections as the aggravating factor in the process of implementing reforms, hoping that the same problem will not come up in 2017.

Chief of the Negotiation group for the Chapter 24 and State Secretary in Ministry of Interior, Zoran Lazarov pointed out that Serbia has started with fulfilling of Action plan for this chapter even before it was officially adopted, and expressed satisfaction by percentage of the fulfilled activities.

“The Action plan for Chapter 24 is not a list of words and numbers, but a document that influences lives of citizens. Format of the screening report is set by European Commission and should be done in a ’traffic light form’.  The work didn’t consist only of adopting laws and bylaws, but also of trainings and strengthening of instruments”, said Lazarov.

During the second part of the meeting, which was closed for public, coordinators for sub-policies presented the Report on the implementation of Action plan in field of migration, asylum, border control, Schengen agreement, judiciary and police cooperation, fight against the organized crime, terrorism, drugs, counterfeiting of the Euro, as well as the custom cooperation.

This meeting, which was held in the National Assembly building, also attended representatives of the European Integration Office, OSCE Mission in Serbia, French embassy, ASTRA Anti-trafficking action, Belgrade Center for Human Rights, European Policy Center, Public Policy Research Centre, Asylum Protection Center, Group 484, Prosecutors association of Serbia, Share Foundation, YUCOM, as well as numerous media representatives.

BCSP is the coordinator of the Working group for Chapter 24 for NCEU – a permanent, institutionalized body within which thematically structured debates between representatives of the state administration, non-governmental organizations, politicians, professionals, professional organizations and the general public on future accession of Serbia to the European Union are conducted. It consists of 21 thematic working groups which are covering all 35 chapters of the Acquis.

Article translated by BCSP intern Emilija Davidovic.

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