Keepin touch

Whether you have a question, comment, suggestion or any problem in the purview of the government, send us your message and we will try to respond as soon as possible. If your problem is not in our purview, we will forward your message to the relevant institution.

The Government of the Republic of Serbia

In the service of citizens

Current issues in process of Serbia’s accession to EU discussed

Belgrade, 21 April 2021

Prime Minister Ana Brnabic chaired today the session of the Coordination Body for the process of accession of the Republic of Serbia to the European Union, dedicated to the most important current issues in the process of our country's accession to the EU.

This primarily refers to the new government's coordination structure for negotiations with the EU, harmonised with the principles of the new methodology of the Union's enlargement policy.

Minister for European Integration and Chief Negotiator of Serbia for Accession Negotiations Jadranka Joksimovic informed members of the government and representatives of the Coordination Body that we expect an intergovernmental conference to be held by the end of June, at which the implementation of the new methodologies for our country will be presented.

According to her, accepting the reformed way of joining the EU, Serbia responsibly and timely introduced the cluster approach in its coordination structure and thus committed itself to even more thorough harmonisation of reform activities and additional political synergy and stronger political leadership of the process, as the new methodology requires.

The activities of the government in all six clusters were considered, primarily those in the first one, which refers to the rule of law.

It was concluded that additional efforts should be directed to reach the transitional criteria in that segment, which were set by the EU, and which are the most important for further progress of the negotiation process.

Joksimovic emphasised that in difficult epidemiological conditions last year, we completed the revision of action plans for negotiating chapters 23 and 24 in consultation with the EU and civil society, assessing that in that way the reform continuity was achieved.

In particular, preparations for the potential opening of cluster 3 – competitiveness and inclusive growth and cluster 4 – green agreement and sustainable connectivity were discussed, as well as further activities to accelerate the implementation of reforms in the accession process.

At the meeting, which was attended by representatives of all ministries, Joksimovic presented the improved and changed negotiating structure, in accordance with the principles of the new methodology.

Given that the new methodology defines six leading EU policies, it was agreed that the negotiating groups, which until now, according to the previous methodology, worked mostly independently, will now be thematically linked within a single cluster, which will be managed by cluster coordinators.

In this way, as explained, the coherence of the Negotiation Support Team will be achieved and the political leadership of the process will be improved, as a new approach and demand.