Prof. Dr Tanja Miscevic, Head of Serbia’s Negotiating Team, presented the reports which contained an analytical overview of the harmonisation of Serbian laws, screening reports and preparation for the opening of negotiation chapters, cross sections of the open chapters, chapters for which a request was sent to submit negotiating positions, chapters for which opening standards were set, chapters the reports on which are in the adoption stage, chapters for which parts of reports were submitted and other chapters, and the principles of transparency and inclusion.

Miscevic said that 27 screening reports have been adopted so far, 18 of which were adopted with the recommendation that negotiations be opened without standards, and for the remaining nine the reports were adopted with the proposal that the chapters be opened once the standards were met.

Miscevic said that of the year three more chapters are expected to be opened by the end – 5, 25 and 26, concerning public procurement, science and research and education and culture, and explained the state-of-play of the chapters which the Republic of Serbia was asked to submit negotiating positions on.

Negotiating positions currently in the stage of informal consultation with the European Commission concern chapter 7 – intellectual property law, 20 – enterprise and industrial policy, 29 – customs union, 30 – external trade relations and 33 – financial and budgetary relations.

Having discussed the presented documents, the Committee members accepted the Report on the Republic of Serbia’s EU accession talks during the Presidency of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, January-July 2016, submitted by the Government, and the Report on the Republic of Serbia’s EU accession talks for the period July-September 2016.

The Committee then proceeded to select members to represent it at the Interparliamentary Conference: “Non-Discrimination of Persons with Disabilities in EU Enlargement Countries”, 28-29 November 2016, at the European Parliament in Brussels.

The sitting was chaired by Committee Chairperson Marinika Tepic, and attended by the following Committee members and deputy members: Dusica Stojkovic, Gordana Comic, Vesna Markovic, Aleksandar Stevanovic, Zvonimir Djokic, Zarko Micin, Elvira Kovacs, Marko Blagojevic, Aleksandra Jerkov and Dubravka Filipovski.