Minister of European Integration Jadranka Joksimović has said today that Serbia is not late in sending a letter to the OSCE for monitoring the elections, and that Serbia has been working to fulfil the given recommendations aimed at further improvement of the electoral environment.
"The elections will not be before spring, which means that it is not too late to send an official letter”, Joksimović has said, answering reporters’ questions at a press conference at the Serbian Government.
She has added that the Serbian Government has been continuously working on these issues with the OSCE for many years, and that a number of steps have been taken since 2017 regarding cooperation and recommendations given by the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) as suggestions.
"We have not implemented all the recommendations and now we are focusing on the implementation of the remaining recommendations that would further improve the electoral environment and conditions under the Law on Elections, which was once highly praised by the European Commission”, she has said.
The Minister has added that, by forming an inter-ministerial working group, the Government has further formalised the implementation and given greater importance to the issue, but it has also undertaken the obligation to enter into this election process with even better electoral conditions.
Serbia is a frontrunner or a favourite for EU membership and one of the first lessons to be learned is fair elections”, the Minister has said.
She has stressed that the conditions for this exist, but that they could be better, i.e. that certain matters should be addressed concerning the lists and everything that has additionally been done, electronic databases etc.
“All this is being discussed, and you will get information whether we have officially sent a letter to the OSCE”, Joksimović has told the reporters.
Deputy Prime Minister Zorana Mihajlović has said that the OSCE has always monitored elections in Serbia and that the invitation will be sent when necessary.
"I am not a member of that working group, but certainly the elections will not be conducted without OSCE monitoring, they will be invited on time and it will not be too late to do so," Mihajlović has said.
She has said that it is in Serbia’s interest that everything goes well in the electoral process, in the most transparent manner and in accordance with the law.
Source: Tanjug
