State Secretary in the Ministry of Justice Radomir Ilić was at the opening of 2nd Attorneys Conference held on 25−28 October on Mt. Zlatibor, where he thanked the attorneys for volunteering to provide free legal aid. ‘It is an important indicator that we are all very conscious of the needs of citizens as regards legal aid, but also the difficult economic situation in which potential beneficiaries of free legal aid find themselves’, Mr Ilić said. He explained that municipalities referred citizens to attorneys found on the list provided to the Ministry of Justice by the Bar Association of Serbia, and published on the Ministry’s website.
Speaking about improvements in mediation, Mr Ilić said he was pleased with the fact that the practicing attorneys had begun to consider mediation reform in its early stage and that the Managing Board of the Serbian Bar Association had already expressed certain views on the matter. He added that the Working Group for the preparation of the draft Amendments to the Mediation and Dispute Resolution Act − comprised of judges of all court levels, attorneys, respectable legal experts, and six attorneys − had not yet begun to prepare the draft Act and that outline of the new system was still being considered. Mr Ilić asked the attorneys to organise gatherings to discuss all possible normative and other solutions which would contribute to the creation of an efficient and sustainable mediation system.
With 1 January 2020 as the enforcement date of the Amendments to the Enforcement and Security Act – a direct result of the Working Group efforts and the active participation of the advocacy representative −, Mr Ilić said he expected that in 2020 the said Amendments would contribute to the resolution of over 650,000 old cases.
Mr Ilić added that the Working Group for monitoring all cases of attacks on attorneys, composed of the representatives of the Ministry of Justice, the Supreme Court of Cassation, the Republic Prosecutor’s Office, the Ministry of Interior and the bar associations, were continuously monitoring all cases involving attacks on attorneys. He noted that the Amendments to the Criminal Code − to be applied as of 1 December 2019 − introduced a new criminal offence: an attack on attorneys, and that the Republic Prosecutor’s Office had issued a general mandatory instruction of immediate action by the public prosecutor’s offices in all cases of attack on attorneys while performing their duties.