EU for Serbia – Support to the 

Supreme Court of Cassation

September 2018 - Ongoing

About the project

Key project beneficiaries are:

  • Supreme Court of Cassation
  • High Judicial Council
  • Ministry of Justice
  • Judicial Academy
  • The Project ​worked closely with the ​four ​​appellate ​courts, ​commercial ​appellate ​court, ​administrative ​court, ​misdemeanor ​appellate ​court, 25 higher courts, 66 basic courts, mediation centres and mediators.

EU for Serbia - Support to the Supreme Court of Cassation ​was an EU funded project. The aim of the project is to contribute to the advancement of Serbia's judicial system and rule of law in line with the EU accession requirements. The Project shall enhance the capacities of the Supreme Court of Cassation and the courts, with reference to backlog reduction and prevention, introduction of the alternative dispute resolution (ADR) with focus on mediation and streamlining of the case-law harmonisation. The project implementation started in September 2018 and ​ended in February 2021 (2.5 years), with overall budget of ​2.​3 million EUR.

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It builds upon very successful EU initiative implemented through the Judicial Efficiency ​Project (JEP) which ended on 31 July 2018.


The project is implemented by a consortium led by the British Council.

Solutions

Key problems that were addressed during project implementation included:

100%

Case backlog reduction

100%

Improvement of ​ADR

legal framework

100%

Further development of ADR long term education

100%

Harmonisation of jurisprudence, including upgrading of case-law database

Achievements

The project activities were designed to improve the overall efficiency of the judiciary, quality of work, access to justice and transparency of the judicial system in the Republic of Serbia. Some of the most important expected project achievements are:

  • At least 30% backlog cases resolved (15% per year of project implementation) and further measures taken in resolving enforcement cases
  • Implemented disposition ratio of at least 100% semi-annually in all basic courts and higher courts in order to reduce backlog cases
  • Existing centralized statistical tool for backlog reduction improved and upgraded in accordance with the CEPEJ Guidelines and EU Justice Scoreboard, in close cooperation with the Statistical Analytical Department in the Supreme Court of Cassation
  • ADR legal framework improved and all relevant stakeholders increased their capacities for implementation of ADR measures
  • Minimum of 10% increase in court cases referred to mediation during lifetime of the project
  • Mediation ​info-desks and info-services established in 10 basic courts and 5 higher courts
  • ADR Strategy developed and adopted by the National ADR Working Group
  • Case-law database ​sustained and functionally improved
  • ​More than 15,000 eligible court cases selected by the four appellate courts entered into the case-law database and available for all judges in basic and higher courts
  • ​More than ​5,000 eligible and anonymized court cases selected by the four appellate courts entered into the case-law database open to public and available for all citizens, legal professionals and interested parties