TS: GRECO report on Serbia is a lesson after six-year delay

NEWS 01.04.202215:57 0 komentara
Transparentnost Srbija
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The GRECO report on Serbia should be understood as another lesson that total commitment to meeting international standards was needed because if it were, it would not have been six years late to meet those recommendations, Transparency Serbia, TS, said on Friday, adding GRECO obviously 'turned a blind eye' to some of them.

The GRECO report from March 30 said more recommendations were fulfilled than previously. Still, TS underlined that it was inappropriate to treat it as an indicator of „seriousness in implementing anti-corruption reforms“.

If the commitment to these reforms were adequate, all 13 GRECO 2015 recommendations would have been fully implemented within the set deadline – by the end of 2016. However, more than six years later, five recommendations had not yet been fully implemented.

„This is most evident in Constitutional changes, where the opportunity to exclude the participation of the Justice Minister from the process of electing and dismissing public prosecutors and the participation of the Parliament in electing members of judicial councils was missed permanently or for some time. GRECO recommended that seven years ago,“ TS added.

The statement further said some of the unfulfilled tasks referred to issues that had yet to be regulated by judicial laws like financing of the judiciary and criteria for evaluating the work of prosecutors.

„It is true that the total number of laws debated by an urgent procedure in the Parliament has been reduced. Public hearings were organised before some laws were passed, but the urgent procedure without public hearings was applied in cases with no real reasons,“ TS added.

Public hearings were not organised in passing those laws that had been changed or passed according to the GRECO recommendations.

„TS believes that GRECO obviously ‘turned a blind eye when it assessed that the recommendation on the Code of Ethics was implemented where, among other things, it was requested to be „effectively applied in practice“.

TS added that „the new Law on Lobbying and the amended Law on Prevention of Corruption in practice did not lead to the desired changes that were the purpose of the GRECO recommendations, even though they were formally fulfilled.“

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