Serbia’s information commissioner, NGOs, and experts have criticised a draft law that they say will make it easier for institutions and companies to withhold important information from the public.

Serbia’s Ministry of State Administration has come under fire for proposing a law that many experts fear will allow institutions to avoid answering freedom of information requests, while totally exempting state-owned commercial companies from the obligation to do so.

Following a string of purges in the wake of the failed 2016 coup in Turkey, hundreds of thousands of people lost their jobs, and tens of thousands more were arrested. Many political opponents of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan fled the country. A partisan judicial system, along with reports of torture in Turkish jails, provided sufficient grounds for many European states to disallow the extradition of Turkish citizens to their home country, even when they were wanted for arrest by Interpol.

Marking International Migrants Day today, on the December 18^th, DRIM project consortium  lead by Slovenian Migration Institute would like to draw your attention to a DRIM project website, where personal stories of individuals from our main target groups (migrants, public authorites, NGO-workers) discussing the need for an improved access to information are being collected.

What happens if you have a legal problem but you can’t afford a lawyer?

In Serbia, we are one step closer to answering that very question.

The average salary in the country is around €365/month, but court and lawyer fees often climb to many times more than this.  As a result, most people cannot afford justice.

After Ratko Mladic was convicted of genocide, Srebrenica survivors announced a lawsuit against Serbia and Republika Srpska – but legal experts said they have little chance of winning compensation.

Serbia’s prosecution told BIRN that the indictment of 11 people who allegedly helped Bosnian Serb Army commander Ratko Mladic hide in Belgrade while he was a fugitive has been declared a state secret.

The families of Serb farmers killed in Kosovo 18 years ago urged Belgrade to sue the NATO peacekeeping force and the UN Mission in Kosovo for not preventing the murders – although experts warned this would be difficult.