On 12 February 2019, the study Equality in Practice - Implementing Serbia’s Equality Laws was presented in the Media Centre in Belgrade as one of the results of the two-year project entitled Improving the Equality Legal and Policy Framework in Serbia and Monitoring Implementation of Equality Norms and Policies, implemented by partner organisations: Praxis, London-based organisation Equal Rights Trust and Sandžak Committee for the Protection of Human Rights and Freedoms, with the support of the European Union.

The study was prepared by the Equal Rights Trust in cooperation with two professional consultants: Prof. Nevena Petrušić, PhD and Lawyer Kosana Beker.

The study addresses the issue of continuous discrimination in Serbia, analyses the exiting legal and political framework and assesses its effectiveness in practice.   In the absence of similar study, the aim of this comprehensive study is to serve as a key reference point and evidence base for all those who work on combating discrimination and promoting fundamental human rights and freedoms. On the other hand, the study aims to influence the government and the judicial system with its own authority and to serve as an effective tool in advocating for improving the efficiency of the anti-discriminatory framework.

The study is based on extensive research conducted over 12-month period including: field research conducted by civil society organisations in different regions of Serbia; focus groups with survivors of discrimination, lawyers and civil society organisations in Niš, Belgrade, Novi Pazar, Pančevo and Vranje; over 55 one-to-one interviews with key stakeholders including lawyers, government and private sector representatives.  In addition, the study includes the analysis and assessment of the compliance of Serbia’s anti-discrimination framework with the country’s international and regional obligations, and the analyses of the extent to which Serbia has adopted the practical measures that are necessary to ensure that its equality laws provide protection in practice.

The findings contained in this study raise serious questions about the efficiency of legislation in practice and indicate that there are areas in which the legislative framework does not ensure international best practice, despite the undisputed progress achieved by Serbia in the past decade in improving conditions and opportunities for exercising the right to equality through the adoption of the Law on the Prohibition of Discrimination and the establishment of an independent body for the protection of equality. The study has revealed a widespread lack of awareness of the existence of anti-discrimination legal framework both among potential victims of discrimination and among public authorities and institutions, and has shown that individuals are unable or unwilling to seek legal redress due to the cost of proceedings and a lack of confidence in the judiciary as an efficient and independent form of redress.

The study provides recommendations that are also priorities that should be addressed in the future in order to improve the efficiency of the Serbia’s existing anti-discrimination legal and political framework in practice.

Joanna Whiteman from the Equal Rights Trust and Lawyer Kosana Beker spoke about the experience of conducting research for the study, the content of the study and expectations regarding its impact on improving the efficiency of protection against discrimination in Serbia. The current challenges from the aspect of various vulnerable groups were presented by civil society representatives who were also members of the Working Group established to provide expert support for the study:  Dijana Malbaša, Autonomous Women’s Centre; Osman Balić, League of Roma; Milan Đurić, Gayten-LGBT; Vladimir Petronijević, Grupa 484; Lazar Stefanović, Mental Disability Rights Initiative.

Study is available in Serbian  and English.

See ERT's statement here.

Media coverage:
Romano Them

The first meeting of the Children’s Rights Council of the Government of the Republic of Serbia this year was held on 12 February 2019 in Belgrade. Jasmina Miković, Praxis Deputy Executive Director and MODS Management Board President, who is also a member of the Children’s Rights Council, participated in the meeting on behalf of MODS.

The Council’s Annual Activity Plan for 2019 was adopted and the participants were informed about developments in the field of children's rights. Ines Cerović, Director of Child Rights Center, informed the members of the Council about the development of indicators for monitoring the recommendations that the Committee on the Rights of the Child had given to Serbia.

In addition, Suzana Paunović, Director of the Office for Human and Minority Rights, informed the participants about the planned activities on the drafting of the Common Core Document in accordance with the agreed guidelines for reporting on international human rights treaties.

UNICEF presented the initiative for the establishment of the National Coalition to Eliminate Child Marriage, with the aim of motivating relevant actors who, through coordinated action, would contribute to the elimination of this harmful phenomenon. After the constituent meeting to be held on February 21st, the coalition will be open to the participation of individuals, public institutions, independent bodies, non-governmental organisations, private sector and the media, or those ready to commit to addressing this problem.

Nadjat Madjid from Morocco, guest participant, spoke about the experiences and good practices in formulating national policies for children, focusing on good practices from Ireland, Kenya and Mauritius.

Finally, UNICEF presented the results of the conference System Cooperation in Supporting Children with Developmental Risks and Disabilities and Their Families - Towards Integrated Early Intervention Services.

See the footage by Tanjug.

The Commissioner for Protection of Equality, acting upon a complaint lodged by Praxis, established a discriminatory action of the Assembly of the City of Kraljevo because by its Decision on Helping Children with Disabilities, it deprived the pupils from internally displaced families residing in the City of Kraljevo of the right to the compensation of the costs of transport, dormitory accommodation and meals, and part of the costs covered by the City in case of necessity for a person accompanying the person with disability.   More specifically, the Assembly of the City of Kraljevo ruled out the possibility for internally displaced pupils with disabilities residing in the City of Kraljevo to exercise the said rights under equal conditions by determining permanent residence as one of the criteria for exercising these rights.  Due to this condition, the Decision violated Articles 7 and 22 of the Law on the Prohibition of Discrimination, which was established in the complaint procedure by the Commissioner for the Protection of Equality who then recommended to the Assembly of the City of Kraljevo to take all measures within its purview to make the decision in question applicable to the pupils who were internally displaced persons with temporary residence registered in the territory of the City of Kraljevo.

It is very important to emphasise, as stated in the Commissioner’s Decision, that status must not be a limiting factor for the exercise of any rights enjoyed by other citizens, and that special attention should be paid to internally displaced children with disabilities who may be exposed to multiple discrimination based on several personal characteristics.

In addition to this, the Commissioner informed the Assembly of the City of Kraljevo that the language and terms were means of combating discrimination, and that it was necessary to recognise that the terminology used when talking about people with disabilities changed over time depending on approach. More specifically, the name of the Decision in question included some outdated terminology that was not in the spirit of anti-discrimination policy, such as "children with special needs", while some provisions of the Decision included terms such as "invalid", "blind and deaf persons", etc. The needs of all people are the same and only the ways of fulfilling them can differ, with disability being only one of the characteristics of a person. It is therefore unacceptable and insulting to focus on someone’s disability.

Before the Commissioner issued an opinion, the City of Kraljevo had not responded to the allegations of the complaint. This is one of a dozen of discriminatory decisions due to which Praxis lodged complaints against the Assembly of the City of Kraljevo. As usual, Praxis will continue to monitor further actions of the competent authorities in terms of aligning the disputed decisions with anti-discrimination legislation.

This is one more opportunity to address public authorities, stressing the importance of respecting human rights, adhering to the principles of non-discrimination and taking into account the needs of the most vulnerable citizens in the policy-making process.

The European Network on Statelessness, with Praxis being one of its members, published a country briefing on the issues significantly affecting the situation of protection against statelessness in Serbia. The briefing points to the problems related to immediate birth registration and prevention of statelessness among children born in Serbia, and provides some positive solutions concerning late birth registration.  

It is pointed out that because of inadequate regulations, children whose parents do not have documents cannot be registered in birth registry books immediately after birth. It is also stressed that children who, according to the law, should acquire citizenship automatically by birth must conduct a separate procedure for acquiring citizenship, and that in practice it is not possible to obtain citizenship by birth in Serbia after reaching the age of 18 years. On the other hand, it is stated that significant progress has been made in Serbia to facilitate access to late birth registration by prescribing a court procedure for determination of date and place of birth, thanks to which many people who had previously been unable to register in birth registry books obtained personal documents.

The briefing also contains recommendations for overcoming the identified obstacles, and states that it is necessary to amend regulations that prevent the registration of children whose parents do not possess documents. It is also stressed that it is necessary to ensure the consistent implementation of the Law on Citizenship to prevent childhood statelessness, and that the time limit for acquiring citizenship by birth should be extended in line with the UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness.

The briefing was published as part of the Statelessness Index,  a comparative tool that assesses how different European countries protect stateless people and what they do to prevent and reduce statelessness. 

On 24 December, 2018, Praxis held a conference in the Media Centre in Belgrade to present the achieved results and remaining challenges in the fields of prevention and elimination of statelessness and child marriages in Serbia.

The conference was opened by Ivanka Kostić, Praxis Executive Director, who welcomed the attendees and gave a brief overview of the multi-year activities implemented by Praxis in the field of preventing statelessness and child marriages with the financial support of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). On that occasion, Ivanka pointed out that thanks to free legal assistance provided by Praxis, in the period of 14 years over 90,000 people had been able to access their basic status rights. She also expressed hope that in the course of 2019, a systemic solution to the problem of stateless persons and legally invisible children would finally be found. Referring to the problem of child marriages in Serbia, Ivanka pointed out that the legal provision allowing early marriages after reaching the age of 16 in exceptional cases had been deleted from the current Draft Law on Family, which indicated the state’s willingness to eradicate child marriages.

Participants were then addressed by Hans Friedrich Schoder, UNHCR Representative in Serbia, who pointed out that in the same period the number of persons at risk of statelessness decreased from 30,000 to 2,100. He highlighted that child marriages represented a disregard for international conventions, in particular the Convention on the Rights of the Child, endangered the girls’ health and had an additional impact on the emergence of statelessness. He also expressed his satisfaction for continuing the cooperation with Praxis and his expectation that a common goal would be achieved and that a systemic solution to the problem of statelessness would be found.

Milan Radojev, Praxis Status and Socioeconomic Rights Programme Coordinator, presented all the remaining problems faced by people at risk of statelessness. He pointed out that there were still newborns in Serbia who could not be registered immediately after birth due to the two by-laws that did not allow their registration if their parents did not possess personal documents, and added that Praxis had submitted an initiative to the Constitutional Court for examining the constitutionality and legality of these regulations, and sent an appeal to the Ministry of Public Administration and Local Self-government regarding their amendments.

Nataša Živković, Head of Sector for Personal Status of Citizens, Keeping Registers and Electoral Rights of the Secretariat for Administration in the Belgrade City Administration also addressed the attendees. Nataša spoke about the background of the problem of illegally invisible persons in Belgrade, as well as the beginning of successful cooperation with Praxis, dating back to 2012. She pointed out that there were currently no active cases in Belgrade relating to the registration of legally invisible persons in the civil registry books, which proved the progress made in reducing the number of legally invisible persons in Serbia.

Jelena Petrović, Praxis Child Rights Programme Coordinator, presented the activities implemented by Praxis for the fourth consecutive year in the field of prevention and elimination of child marriages with the aim of raising awareness about the harmfulness of this phenomenon. On that occasion, she also highlighted the observations gained by Praxis through educational and counselling work with Roma parents, children and representatives of relevant institutions. Jelena explained that a major obstacle to fighting against child marriages was the perceiving of the phenomenon of child marriages out of the context of Roma tradition and culture, in particular by the competent authorities, and the lack of records on child marriage cases kept by relevant institutions.

Sadija Gicić, a social worker and women’s rights activist, spoke about the responsibilities of institutions in cases of child marriage. She stressed the importance of timely response of institutions and pointed to their duty to act in accordance with binding protocols.

Finally, it was concluded that, regardless of the achievements in the field of prevention and elimination of the emergence of legally invisible persons, it was necessary to continue the intensive work on eliminating the remaining challenges in order to prevent the emergence of new cases of legally invisible and stateless persons. In the field of prevention and elimination of child marriages, in addition to the civil sector that was making the biggest contribution in combating this extremely harmful traditional practice, decision makers, social welfare centres, the police, prosecution, schools, health care institutions and the media should be involved more actively and in a coordinated manner, because without efforts of all relevant actors, it was not possible to ensure a solution to this problem.

Listen to the recording of Radio Beograd 1 about conference here.
See the article of Danas daily here.
See the article of Beta news agency here.

Throughout October and November 2018, Praxis continued providing assistance to refugees/migrants, through information, psychosocial support, referrals to the targeted assistance provided by various organisations/institutions or covering the costs of transport to the asylum and reception centres.

A total of 2678 newly arrived refugees/migrants were informed about current situation in Serbia and the region, legal status and available legal options (seeking asylum in Serbia, assisted voluntary return to the country of origin, possibilities of family reunification abroad or resettlement to a third country when possible), accommodation in asylum centres (AC) or transit-reception centres in Serbia, means of transportation to the assigned centres, other rights and available services (medical care, psychosocial support, food, NFIs, various workshops for refugees/ migrants etc).

Download the whole Protection Monitoring Report for October here.

Download the whole Protection Monitoring Report for November here.

Legal obstacles that prevent registration of all children into birth registry books immediately after birth have not been eliminated in 2018.  This means that due to inappropriate provisions of by-laws regulating registration into birth registry books, children whose mothers do not possess personal documents will continue to remain unregistered at birth. Consequently, in the most vulnerable period of their lives, these children will be deprived of or will encounter significant obstacles to accessing a large number of rights, including health care and social protection.

Such situation is contrary to both national legislation and ratified international conventions. More specifically, the Constitution of the Republic of Serbia, the Law on Family, the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights guarantee every child the right to personal name and entry in the registry of births immediately after birth. Therefore, setting conditions for registration into birth registry books that cannot be met by all citizens, such as providing that undocumented mothers cannot register their children, constitutes a gross violation of the rights of the child. Unfortunately, there is still a significant number of people in Serbia, mainly Roma, who do not possess ID cards and other documents.

A series of recommendations issued to Serbia by international organisations and treaty bodies indicate that the situation in Serbia related to timely birth registration is not satisfactory. Thus, the UN Human Rights Committee recommended to Serbia to enhance its efforts to enable registration of children born to parents without identification documents. Similar recommendations were given by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child and the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The European Parliament called for full implementation of the right to timely birth registration, while the the UN Human Rights Council, in the Universal Periodic Review for Serbia, recommended to Serbia to provide the registration into birth registry books immediately after birth, without discrimination and regardless of whether parents had personal documents. Serbia accepted this recommendation of the UN Human Rights Council and committed to fulfil the UN Sustainable Development Goals, including to provide universal registration into birth registry books.

However, despite the accepted obligations and proclaimed commitment to allowing every child to register in birth registry books immediately after birth, Serbia has not yet removed legal obstacles that impede registration of a significant number of children. Moreover, in 2018, the Ministry of Public Administration and Local Self-government refused Praxis’ suggestions to amend legislation to allow all children to be timely registered in birth registry books. 

Given the fact that this situation is unsustainable both in terms of respecting human rights and in terms of compliance of secondary legislation with primary legislation, with Serbia being in the position of a state that does not fulfil its international obligations, Praxis once again stresses that it is necessary that the competent institutions take immediate action to allow every child to be registered in birth registry books immediately after birth.