“At the moment, Serbia is well on its path to EU membership and its current position allows to it make swift progress in the negotiations,” said Head of the EU Delegation to Serbia Michael Davenport adding he hoped new chapters would soon be opened in the accession negotiations.
At the conference held to mark the completion of the three-year EU programme “PLAC” aimed at supporting Serbia to align its legislation with the EU, Davenport said the programme had provided substantial support to Serbia adding he hoped it would be relaunched.
He said the PLAC programme had supported Serbia in tackling 14 negotiating chapters, namely chapters 27 and 3, dealing with energy and freedom to provide services, respectively.
We highly appreciate Serbian Government’s commitment to European integration, said Davenport at the conference participated in, among others, by Head of Serbian EU negotiating team Tanja Miscevic.
Ambassador Davenport said he hoped to see “PLAC” programme relaunched before the end of summer.
He said Serbia, being an EU candidate country, should be flexible when aligning its legislation with the EU as the Union itself was changing all the time and added that Serbia would be joining, not the Union of today, but the Union of tomorrow.
The “PLAC” programme provided significant support in tackling not only chapter 3, dealing with freedom to provide services, but also chapter 13 dealing fisheries, Miscevic said.
She added that chapter 3 had proven to be rather complex due to high number of institutions which dealt with service provision.
Acting Director of Serbian European Integration Office Ksenija Milenkovic said 115 experts were engaged in the “PLAC” programme over the three-year implementation period.
Apart from the alignment of Serbian legislation with the EU, the Programme also included training for civil servants, Milenkovic said.
The “PLAC” programme aimed at supporting Serbia’s EU accession has been funded by the EU.
