strengthening the role of serbian parliament and young politicians in the european integration process

timeline: April 2006 – September 2007
donor: Slovak Aid (Bratislava – Belgrade Fund)
sectoral priorities: Assistance to Serbia and Montenegro in their integration in international organizations and the EU

After the opening of the Stability and Association Agreement process in October 2005, Serbia began the long process of legal harmonization and integration to the European Union. In the coming years, Serbian state institutions need to build up their capacities for dealing with EU-related tasks.

Bearing in mind the crucial role of the Parliament in the European integration, the goal of this project is to strengthen the capacity and expertise of the Serbian Parliament, resp. its European Integration Committee and their support staff (experts of the newly founded EU Integration Office in the Serbian Parliament). To achieve greater impact, the main project activities are extended to the group of young Serbian politicians, engaged in the framework of seminars organized by the NGO Belgrade Fund for Political Excellence.

The project, which is funded by the Slovak development assistance program (SlovakAid) intends to develop a competence of the relevant Members and employees of the Serbian Parliament and to create better preconditions for contribution by the Serbian Parliament to the definition of an agreed EU integration process strategy on the national level through the seminars, trainings and study trips to Bratislava and Brussels. At the same time, we included in the project the seminars of Croatian experts, which will enable our target groups to acquire a unique expertise to compare the experience in the process of EU integration of Slovakia as a new Member State and Croatia, a country that has just recently begun the accession negotiations.