Justice Minister: Serbia Sending Response to Venice Commission’s Draft Opinion on April 21

Nenad Vujic (BETAPHOTO/MILAN ILIC)

Serbian Justice Minister Nenad Vujic has said that Belgrade is conversant with and follows the standards of the Venice Commission, an advisory body of the Council of Europe (CoE), adding that the Serbian Parliament’s response to the Commission’s draft opinion on a package of judicial and electoral laws will be submitted on April 21. 

Vujic has told the RTS public broadcaster that all changes were made in accordance with the Venice Commission’s standards. 

“Perhaps, certain guarantees should be added, some norms should be further clarified and elaborated, but with regard to the most important question as to who directs prosecutors to other prosecutor’s offices, we were right that it is the task of the High Council, because it is the standard of the Venice Commission,” Vujic explained. 

On April 20, parliament speaker Ana Brnabic said that Belgrade had received the Venice Commission’s opinion on the set of judicial laws, proposed by MP Ugljesa Mrdic, which, she said, was positive, adding that the judicial laws would be right away amended in the manner recommended by the Commission.

The Commission is set to adopt its final opinion in June. 

“As a responsible state, we will start working even before the adoption of a final opinion in June, because we want to work hard on our EU integration and we wish to demonstrate to the European Commission our readiness and also our intellectual capacity to understand what we are required to do,” Vujic said.

He also said that after second round of consultations with experts, the Justice Ministry would start preparing changes to the laws which, would “lead to further clarification and introduction of additional guarantees against any sort of arbitrariness.”

Asked whether all obligations in the domain of the rule of law would be fulfilled by the end of May, the minister said that it was a major job, which did not depend only on the Justice Ministry, but also on the speed of the European Commission’ response.

“We are ready. We have already fulfilled the most important part of our obligations. We have a package of 10 laws that were sent to Brussels in September and October last year and we are waiting for answers from Brussels about compliance with the EU standards. We have completed our part of the work,” Vujic said.