SERBIA: Israel Agreements & more – 17th Sep 2024

th of September: 2024

On Wednesday the 11th, Serbia’s president Vucic and his Israeli counterpart Herzog announced that they are planning to establish a free trade agreement between the two countries. At the roundtable discussion, Serbia’s chamber of commerce signed three memorandums of understanding with Israel related to trade and exports. Additionally, the countries signed a joint declaration on technological innovation cooperation.

The meeting of Vucic and Herzog comes amid ongoing Israeli military operations in Palestine, with reports of there being more than 40,000 casualties and another 90,000 people wounded.

Next, the case of the September twenty twenty-three armed attack in Banjska, Kosovo, has progressed as Kosovo’s Special Prosecution filed an indictment on Wednesday the 11th, charging forty-five suspects for the attack. The next day, the European Commission welcomed Kosovo’s move.

Last year in September, we reported on the armed assault that Serbian militants carried out against the Kosovo Police in the northern city of Banjska. The incident left one policeman and three of the militants dead. Later Kosovo, along with the EU, classified the incident as a terrorist attack.

The Head of the Special Prosecution said in a press conference that they believe that the suspects are guilty of crimes related to terrorism, and crimes against Kosovo’s constitutional order and security.

On an unrelated note, eighty-six opposition parliament members called for changes to the Law on Mining and Geological Research, aiming to prohibit the exploration and exploitation of lithium and boron ores. The opposition proposed that the government change the list of mineral raw materials of strategic importance so it doesn’t include lithium and boron, banning their exploration. Ana Brnabic, the president of the National Assembly, said that the law changes will be on the Assembly’s agenda soon, but did not specify when the Assembly would hold the session discussing the amendments.

The call for the changes comes after a series of protests against lithium mining in the country. Lithium mining and its impact on the environment have become a very popular topic ever since Rio Tinto, an Anglo-Australian mining giant, launched a project to exploit lithium in the western region of Jadar in twenty twenty-one. Since then, massive protests and blockades have ensued, all in the hopes of banning mining in Serbia, as it could severely damage the country’s environment.

In some news on the economy, over the past few weeks, Serbia’s National Bank has published several drafts on acts related to joining the Single Euro Payments Area, or SEPA, which is the EU’s unified payment system. The SEPA system enables mutual payments with waiting times of no more than two days and no commission fees, and a total of thirty-six countries in Europe are using it. Western Balkan countries have still not joined the system, but most of them are preparing to do so. In Serbia, the National Bank is drawing up amendments to laws related to payments to publish them by the end of the year. The country has to make changes to the law so that it harmonizes with the EU’s regulations on payments, and join the SEPA system.

Still, experts say that Serbia has to be careful about creating regulations in the domain of payments, since there is a possibility that the state reserves might suddenly deplete if the country abolishes the control mechanisms for the outflow of foreign currency — which is an EU requirement.

Speaking of payments, on Wednesday the 11th, the government announced a salary increase of twelve percent for teachers in elementary and high schools, while the non-teaching school staff will get a raise of eight percent. With this increase, the average salary in the education sector would amount to around 100,000 dinars, which is around a thousand dollars.

However, the related trade unions were dissatisfied with the newly proposed salaries, as the government is planning on increasing the wage in the public sector by around 8%. That would still put the teaching staff salaries below the average of the public sector wages (by around 7,000 dinars, or around seventy dollars). The teachers are asking the government to raise their salaries so that they amount to the planned increased wages of the public sector workers. They are dissatisfied with their increased salaries being around 1,000 dollars, while the increased salaries of public sector workers will be almost 1,100 dollars. So teachers from all over Serbia went on a strike on Monday the 16th.

More about the economy as the State Statistical Office, or RZS, reported on Thursday the 12th that the annual consumer price inflation for August was around four percent - an increase of around 0.5 percent compared to the same month last year. The largest price increases were seen in postal services, with around fifty percent, waste disposal services, with a hike of around twenty percent, and rent and housing services, with an increase of around fifteen percent.

In some health-related news, last week the Institute for Public Health of Vojvodina said that the results of a drinking water analysis they had conducted were confidential. This announcement follows numerous calls to test the safety of Novi Sad’s drinking water after the news broke out about its contamination with Nematode roundworms.

Recall that a month ago, we reported that the Public Utility Company for Waterworks and Sewage spoke about the water’s contamination in a private Viber group, and then the Movement for the Restoration of the Kingdom of Serbia, or POKS, party revealed it to the public. Dragan Milicevic, an assembly member from the POKS party, said that the results need to be public, since they are a public health matter. He added that his party will exhaust all possible legal options in order to obtain the water analysis results.

In other news, Belgrade’s Hotel Yugoslavia, a cultural landmark built after World War II, is facing potential demolition to make way for a luxury residential and business high-rise project. Art historians consider the hotel to be part of the cultural heritage of the capital, Belgrade. However, the capital’s government plans to build yet another luxury high-rise, disregarding not only Belgrade’s cultural heritage but also the spirit of sustainable development. Researchers at the Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory noted that the future of Hotel Yugoslavia should be the outcome of a dialogue between the experts and the general public.

The U.S. News & World Report published their annual Best Countries list, based on more than seventy features they deem essential for the success of a nation. The twenty twenty-four report covered eighty-nine states, each ranked based on factors such as quality of life, entrepreneurship, adventure, and social purpose. Serbia ranked second to last, taking the 88th spot, with only Belarus ranking lower. The report noted that Serbia was culturally rich, but driven by ethnic tensions. The best ranking countries on the list were Switzerland, Japan and the US.

Despite the low ranking on the Best Countries list, Serbia placed high in the International Telecommunication Union’s, or ITU’s, Global Cybersecurity Index list. The ITU ranked 172 countries in the world based on five key development components, including legal, technical, organizational, capacity-development and cooperation measures. Based on these, the ITU put the countries in five tiers, which are from lowest to highest - Building, Evolving, Establishing, Advancing, and Role-Modeling. The list placed Serbia in the Role-Modeling tier, alongside the US, Japan, Qatar and forty other countries with a score of more than ninety-five. The ITU also noted that Serbia is among the nations with the most advanced cybersecurity. Among the lowest ranking countries in the Building tier with less than twenty points were the Vatican, and Yemen.

Finally, a bit of culture, as the second Novi Sad Film Festival will take place from the 18th to the 22nd of September, and will feature films from all across the world. Some of the most successful foreign movies that will be screened include Voy, Voy, Voy! from Egypt, Šalša from Croatia and Lena and Vladimir from North Macedonia The tickets cost 500 dinars, which is around five dollars, and are available for purchase online and at various sale points across the country. For more information, check out the link in the show notes!

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

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Do daljnjeg, zbogom!