Before the deputies Assembly of Serbia on Wednesday, there will be amendments to the Law on Seats and Areas of Courts and Public Prosecutions, the Law on To the High Prosecutorial Council, the Law on the Organization and Competence of State Bodies for Combating High-Tech Crime, the Law on Public Prosecution and the Law on Judges.
Those amendments were proposed by the deputy of the Serbian Progressive Party Ugljesa Mrdic, and he hinted at them after a hunger strike due to dissatisfaction with the work of the Public Prosecutor's Office for Organized Crime (JTOK).
Who "rebelled" from the state
Mrdić emphasized several times that the motive for such a move was that certain parts of the prosecution "rebelled with the state", and he singled out the Supreme Public Prosecutor as an individual. Zagorka Dolovac and the Chief Public Prosecutor of the Prosecutor's Office for Organized Crime Mladen Nenadić.
Professional associations, judicial unions and the opposition warn that the amendments invalidate constitutional changes, circumvent European standards and enable direct political influence on judges and prosecutors, i.e. that the independence of the prosecution will be seriously threatened and heavily influenced by the executive power.
In those proposals for changes, several provisions are mentioned, which aim to change the very solutions that were introduced into the Serbian legal system after it was changed. Constitution in the part that concerns the judiciary. The goal of those changes was to institutionally strengthen the independence of the judiciary and the independence of the prosecution, and as part of fulfilling the obligations from the negotiation chapter 23 in the negotiations with EU.
With his proposals, Mrdić wants some of those solutions to be deleted or changed.
What does Mrdić propose?
According to Mrdić's proposals, it is planned to move the decision-making on prosecutors' objections to mandatory instructions from a special commission made up of prosecutors and hand it over to the jurisdiction of the High Council of Prosecutors, where apart from the prosecutors, the Minister of Justice sits, as well as four "prominent lawyers" elected by the Serbian Parliament.
The second solution proposed by Mrdić concerns the return of the institution of referral, with the written consent of the prosecutor himself. When someone is sent to a prosecutor's office, his stay in that institution depends on the will of the Chief Prosecutor who sent him there.
The proposals envisage the establishment of a new Fourth Basic Court in Belgrade, which would be responsible exclusively for the municipality of Novi Beograd. In this way, the municipality in Serbia with the most inhabitants would be separated from the jurisdiction of the existing Third Basic Court. By creating a new court, a new prosecutor's office would be created at the same time.
It is also planned that the Prosecutor's Office for high-tech crime will be transferred under the jurisdiction of the Higher Prosecutor's Office in Belgrade. This would make this prosecutor's office, which is currently under the authority of the Supreme Prosecutor's Office, a special department of the Belgrade Prosecutor's Office and be subordinate to it.
The possibility of appointing acting officials to the position of the Supreme Prosecutor, as well as to the position of Chief Prosecutors, is foreseen. Thus, the Acting Supreme Prosecutor could act in that capacity for one year, while the chief prosecutors have a term of three years, with the possibility of re-election.
One proposal also applies to judges, by deleting the prohibition that court presidents can be elected for only one five-year term and introducing the possibility of re-election.
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