Women's Space and Roma Women Network activist participated in the consultations with the European Commission and contributed to the Progress Report of Serbia to European Union membership. Since March 2002 the European Commission provides regular reports to the European Council and the European Parliament regarding western Balkan region countries progress and civil society representatives participate in writing reports considering human rights in Serbia.
At this year consultations, which was held on May 25th, representatives of women human rights organizations were present: Labris - Lesbian Human Rights Organization from Belgrade, Novi Sad Lesbian Organization, Fenomena from Kraljevo and Women's Space from Niš (also representing Roma Women Network of Serbia). This visit was implemented through the assistance of women foundation Kvinna Till Kvinna of Sweden and LGBTI organization - ILGA Europe. Activists were also enabled to personally meet with present chiefs of staff and other employees of the EC Enlargement Directorate and discuss present problems and challenges Serbia encounters regarding the women, Roma women and LGBT rights.
Meetings were held with Andris Kesteris, Henk Visser, Thomas Ljungquist, Louis Hers from the EU Enlargement and EU Justice Directorates of the EC, and Vera Kurtić, Women's Space and RWN activist indicated there are still no publicly available information regarding the strategy documents implementation, nor information regarding methods of coordination within the process of their implementation. Currently, there are over 100 strategies and action plans adopted in Serbia nationally. Some of these documents either directly or indirectly relate to women rights or rights of minority groups. Roma women hold particularly important the National Action Plan for the Roma women position improvement found which is an integral part of the joint Action Plan and which follows the Strategy of Roma position improvement but is not supported through any budget line, Vera Kurtić stressed in her presentation.
The meeting also included discussion regarding prolongation of judicial processes and the fact that leaders of extreme right wing organizations experience gentle legal reprisals on the bases of racial and other discrimination expressed during 2009 and 2010. Attention was paid to the unpopular changes in the Law of Litigation procedures that are contrary to the Constitution since they minimize achieved level of human rights.
General conclusion of the 2010 report was that "further investment into efforts to coordinate legislation and policies with the European standards need to be made and insurance to secure application and implementation of adopted legislation relating to the EU", and we believe that this year's report conclusion will be, as the legal system of Serbia stands on a satisfactory level but the full legislation implementation is lacking.
This report, which is published annually, contains among other issues: Summary of Serbia and EU relations, Serbia situation analysis regarding political membership criteria, Serbia situation analysis on the basis of economical membership criteria and evaluation of Serbia's ability to implement EU standards, i.e. gradually coordinate its legislation and policies with the legal attainments of the EU all in accordance with the Stabilization and Association Agreement between European Communities and their member states and the Republic of Serbia and on the priorities of the European partnership.
