The Strategy is a follow-up to the Operative Plan to Prevent Corruption in High-Risk Areas (Оперативни план за спречавање корупције у областима од посебног ризика, hereinafter, the Plan) of 2021. The document stresses that by the time of adoption of the Strategy, 76.1% of the measures foreseen by the Plan had been implemented.

However, according to the data provided in the introduction to the Strategy, corruption remains a serious problem for the country: between 2012 and 2023, Serbia scored from 39 to 42 points (between 0 and 100, where 100 is the best performance) in the Corruption Perception Index, and it had not got more than
-0.23 (between -2.5 and 2.5, where 2.5 is the best performance) under the control of corruption indicator of the Worldwide Governance Indicators. The lack of any positive changes is proven also by the assessment of the impact of strategic anti-corruption documents conducted by the Corruption Prevention Agency (Агенција за спречавање корупције) that showed that three out of four indicators had negative dynamics, while the last indicator remained unchanged.

In this context, the Government continues to make an effort to enhance the effectiveness of the fight against corruption by adopting the Strategy.

The main goal of the Strategy is to build democratic society based on the principles of the rule of law, transparency and responsibility, as well as integrity and corruption prevention.

The Strategy covers five key areas:

1. Improvement of the legal framework

In this area, the document sets the following objectives:

• Assess the need to amend Law of 23 November 2016 No. 94/2016-14 “On Work of Government Bodies to Counter Organised Crime, Terrorism and Corruption” (Закон о организацији и надлежности државних органа у сузбијању организованог криминала, тероризма и корупције), the Criminal Code and the Code of Criminal Procedure concerning:

1. Powers of the heads of units of prosecutorial bodies responsible for countering corruption and court presidents, verification checks with respect to them;
2. Immunity of the members of the Government in case they commit corruption offences;
3. Powers of prosecutorial bodies with regard to the senior officials;
4. Procedure for interaction between prosecutorial bodies and the police in pre-investigative checks;

• Improve the procedure for confiscation of illegally acquired property;
• Improve control of financing of political parties, including comprehensive oversight over donations and expenditures, establishment of liability measures proportionate to the offences;
• Put domestic anti-corruption laws in line with the regulations of the European Union, relevant international standards and best practices.

2. Enhanced institutional environment

In this area, the Strategy sets such objectives as:

• Strengthen interagency cooperation in countering corruption, in particular, by establishing an information system to exchange data and creating standing working groups;
• Enhance the potential of judges, prosecutors, and officers of anti-corruption bodies through training;
• Provide the public bodies responsible for countering corruption with the necessary human and financial resources;
• Adopt internal strategies for determining the priority of cases in prosecutorial bodies to increase the number of investigations of “grand corruption”;
• Provide prosecutorial bodies with the possibility to conduct permanent monitoring with the aim to counter corruption also with the right to use the reports of the Anti-Corruption Council (Savet za borbu protiv koprupcije) and/or other public bodies disposing of relevant data as a source of information;
• Enhance the potential of control (oversight) activities with regard to the customs and tax authorities;
• Carry out international cooperation in investigation and prosecution of large-scale fraud and/or embezzlement of the EU funds.

3. Enhanced transparency

To enhance transparency, the Strategy formulates such objectives as:

• Introduce a legal obligation to notify about the activities similar to lobbying, but not falling within the scope of the requirements of Law of 9 November 2018 No. 87/2018-85 “On Lobbying” (Закон о лобирању);
• Draft and adopt a legal act providing for the participation of society in elaborating planning documents under Law of 31 August 2009 No. 72/2009-105 “On Planning and Construction” (Закону о планирању и изградњи);
• Enhance the visibility of the public bodies responsible for the fight against corruption in the Internet, including regular publication of information about their activities;
• Establish regular channels of communication between anti-corruption bodies and journalists, the media and civil society organisations;
• Ensure the possibility to use the digital Register of Corruption Cases created in 2023 and containing information about over 10,000 corruption cases as an instrument for accountability and a unified storage of data on corruption cases;
• Define the procedure for the public bodies and local government bodies to publish information in open access;
• Oblige local government bodies to publish, in open access, draft legal acts and hold public discussions of these acts;
• Enhance the enforcement of Law of 2 November 2004 No. 120/2004-5 “On Free Access to Information of Public Interest” (Закон о слободном приступу информацијама од јавног значаја);
• Enhance transparency of expenditures for the programmes and projects implemented by civil society organisations and the media.

4. Promotion of the principles of integrity

In this area, the document sets the following objectives:

• Draft and adopt the necessary additional legal acts regulating the procedure for appointing and promoting prosecutors and judges, assessment of their performance and compliance with the ethics and integrity principles;
• Consider the need to amend legal acts defining the procedure for notifying about conflicts of interest by members of the Government, as well as the rules for regulating the “revolving door” and integrity checks with regard to them;
• Harmonize the provisions of Law of 3 April 2019 No.25/2019-40 “On Healthcare” (Закон о здравственој заштити) concerning conflicts of interest and of those of Law of 21 May 2019 No.35/2019-6 “On Countering Corruption” (Закон о спречавању корупције), adopt legal acts regulating other paid activities of the employees of the healthcare system, acceptance of gifts, and appointment of the heads of public health organisations;
• Establish a legally-binding obligation of public bodies and local government bodies to inform the candidates to positions about the restrictions, prohibitions and obligations imposed on them;
• Improve the procedure for recruiting the employees of public-law companies;
• Impose the restriction to undertake another paid activity on police officers;
• Introduce regular integrity checks of police officers;
• Improve the procedure for selecting, appointing and promoting the heads of the bodies subordinate to the Ministry of the Interior;
• Develop a Register of positions in the police that are subject to increased corruption risks;
• Carry out integrity checks with regard to all candidates to the positions in public bodies and local government bodies;
• Monitor the enforcement of Law of 25 November 2014 No. 128/2014-3 “On Protection of Whistleblowers” (Закон о заштити узбуњивача), Law of 24 December 2019 No. 91/2019-3 “On Public Procurement” (Закон о јавним набавкам) and the legal acts regulating conflicts of interest.

5. Awareness-raising about corruption

In this last area, the Strategy provides for the following objectives:

• Organise training for servants (employees) of the public sector, including judges and prosecutors, about the forms and negative impact of corruption, and the ways to report corruption;
• Raise public awareness about the importance to counter corruption, in particular, through educational courses in schools.

In addition to the National Anti-Corruption Strategy for the years 2024 to 2028, an Action Plan for 2024 to 2025 and an Action Plan for 2026 to 2028 will be adopted.

The monitoring and assessment of effectiveness of implementation of the Strategy will rest with a Governmental Working Group (Радно тело Владе) and the Corruption Prevention Agency.

*The adoption of the Anti-Corruption Strategy by Serbia is a condition for its adhesion to the European Union.