At the invitation of the Presiding Justice of the Supreme Court of Serbia, Vida Petrovic-Skero, and the Head of the OSCE Mission to Serbia and Montenegro, Hans Ole Urstad, the Chairman of the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, Predrag Markovic, today opened a two-day conference devoted to discussion of Serbia’s High Judicial Council.

Addressing the attendees, Mr Markovic emphasised that the main aim of the conference would be to get to know both the good and the bad experiences of other countries, which would, in his words, ‘teach’ us that the High Judicial Council, as important a body as it is, is at the same time part of the system. ‘Only if we know what we strive for, what we can do, and what we really want, we will be able to define the High Judicial Council and its role in Serbia’s new constitution’. The National Judiciary Reform Strategy will be strengthened and passed by the National Assembly by the end of May, if its stability is upheld responsibly, and enshrined in the new constitution, Markovic said. He told the conference that its discussion should make it possible for anyone in Serbia wishing to learn to hear both the good and the bad experiences – and not in order for Serbia to avoid them, but so that Serbia could learn not to be afraid of the issues at hand. Markovic added that the judiciary was Serbia’s priority, as evidenced by both the Government and the National Assembly, re-iterating his message that Serbia’s priorities today were ‘stability, solidarity, and standards’, in that order, as they can be fulfilled in that order only, and as without the necessary stability and solidarity it was impossible to attain the standards towards which Serbia as a society strives.

The ‘High Judicial Council – a comparative analysis of European and regional models’ conference is being organised by the High Judicial Council of the Republic of Serbia and the OSCE Mission to Serbia and Montenegro on 9 and 10 May 2006 at Belgrade’s Sava Centre.