‘With the new Personal Data Protection Act, Serbia now has the same regulation as do the most modern European countries’, Justice Minister Nela Kuburović has stated at a personal data protection press conference organised by the Foreign Investors Council. She added that the Act had received positive reviews from the European Commission and that it was fully compliant with the European Union (EU) directives on personal data protection. ‘We have fully harmonised the statute with the EU regulation and directive which came into effect last May and which apply to the member states’, she stated, noting that Serbia was modelling the practice and using the experiences of European countries.
Minister Kuburović stressed that the new Personal Data Protection Act − often a subject of evaluation for Serbia’s EU-accession progress report and, thus, being of great importance − drew the attention of not only the home public but also international partners. ‘The fact that commercial entities doing business with the EU countries have already been operating in line with the EU’s personal data protection rules, means that the implementation of the Act will allow for a reciprocal application of the same rules when business is conducted in the Republic of Serbia’, Kuburović noted.
The Justice Minister reiterated that personal data protection was one of the fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution, and that the purpose of the new statute was to expand the scope of individual’s rights and their protection. She added that the Ministry of Justice remained a transparent partner to the Foreign Investors Council and the others, in order to facilitate an efficienct application of the new Act which is to enter into force on 21 August. ‘The Foreign Investors Council has been very engaged in the course of the entire public debate, offering comments and proposals to the draft text which have resulted in many solutions being incorporated into the Act’, Minister Kuburović concluded.
Member of the Foreign Investors Council’s Board of Directors Mr Goran Pekez emphasised how important the new statute was for attracting foreign investors and new projects, explaining that those in Europe and elsewhere in the world were increasingly interested in knowing whether a country had implemented a personal data protection act and whether it had an established personal data protection practice. ‘We are looking at the bigger picture, something which will determine whether Serbia will be the chosen destination for many important investment projects. That is why I am very pleased to see that representatives of the Serbian Government have recognised the importance of the matter as well as clear leadership’, Pekez stated.