According to the new Draft Law on the Protector of Citizens, which has been up for public consultation since Wednesday, 28 April 2021, the Protector of Citizens will be acting as the National Rapporteur on Trafficking in Human Beings, Ms. Jelena Stojanović, the Deputy Protector of Citizens for Child Rights and Gender Equality, has said.

"The Protector of Citizens, as an independent state body, is experienced in conducting investigations, both upon citizens' complaints and on own initiative, to control the legality and regularity of the competent bodies’ work upon learning that trafficking in human beings is implicated,” said Ms. Stojanović at the meeting of the Regional Working Group of representatives of national institutions that handle monitoring and reporting in the field of trafficking in human beings.

At the online meeting, Stojanović reminded that the revised Action Plan for the negotiating Chapter 23 envisages the appointment of a national rapporteur on trafficking in human beings within the Institution of the Protector of Citizens. The meeting of the Regional Working Group, consisting of representatives of national institutions from Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Northern Macedonia, Albania and Serbia, was held within the regional project "BAN 3 - Balkans Act Now" implemented by the "Astra" organization.

In the Regional Working Group, each country is represented by three representatives of the national working group that prepared the monitoring report to review the situation in the field of protection of trafficking victims, which can serve to monitor the efficiency and effectiveness of legislative and institutional mechanisms to combat trafficking. On behalf of the Republic of Serbia, the working group includes representatives of the Protector of Citizens, the Ministry of the Interior and the Center for the Protection of Victims of Trafficking in Human Beings.

The Action Plan for implementing the Strategy for Improving the Status of Persons with Disabilities in the Republic of Serbia from 2020 to 2024 designates the Protector of Citizens to act as the national monitoring mechanism on the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

The Protector of Citizens has been designated by the Action Plan as one of the partners in implementing the activities dedicated to developing and implementing an accessibility action plan.
The Action Plan, adopted by the Government of the Republic of Serbia in early April this year, refers to the period from 2021 to 2022, and the Protector of Citizens provided normative opinions in the process of preparing this strategic document.

The Protector of Citizens’ suggestion to reform the legislative framework in the field of legal capacity in order to ensure that people with disabilities enjoy all the rights on an equal footing with other citizens and to set up an assistive decision making system that would replace guardianship protection was inserted in the Action Plan.

Further to the Protector of Citizens’ suggestion, the Action Plan specifies and enables larger availability of services for the protection of sexual and reproductive health of girls and women with disabilities, as well as creating multidisciplinary trainings regarding the manner of treatment, access to and provision of healthcare services for persons with disabilities and realization of these trainings.

The Protector of Citizens suggested, and the Government of the Republic of Serbia included in the Action Plan, intensification of additional assistance services to students and pupils with developmental disabilities and with disabilities, particularly at the local level.

Further to the Protector of Citizens’ suggestion, preparation of cost analysis of the Budget Fund for professional rehabilitation and employment of persons with disabilities in the period from 2009 to 2020 has been made part of the Action Plan within the measures of active employment policy of persons with disabilities in the open labor market.

Upon learning from the media that a Roma child was abused after being taken to the police station in Brus, and subsequently fainted, the Protector of Citizens launched own-initiative investigation to control work legality and regularity of the Ministry of Interior of the Republic of Serbia.

The Protector of Citizens has requested the MOI to submit, within 15 days, the information and relevant documentation on activities undertaken in order to examine the allegations on possible overstepping police powers by the police officer of Brus PS, as well as on the measures taken if his responsibility has been established.

The Protector of Citizens has requested MOI as well to notify him whether the allegations that the child was detained without being accompanied by a parent and that the child was interrogated without the presence of a person trained to work with minors are true.

In partnership with the Social Inclusion and Poverty Reduction Unit of the Government of the Republic of Serbia and the Standing Conference of Towns and Municipalities - Association of Towns and Municipalities of Serbia, the Protector of Citizens awards the prizes, for the fifth time in a row, to towns, municipalities and city municipalities in the Republic of Serbia that contributed to the development of all forms of accessibility within their territory in 2020, i.e. within their environment.

In the document sent today to municipalities, towns and city municipalities, the Protector of Citizens invited local self-government units to apply to the Public Call, and thus present and promote good practice examples in developing accessibility on their territory in 2020.

The Protector of Citizens has pointed out that the accessibility award emerged as an expression of the need to highlight the breakthroughs of individuals and/or institutions in creating good practice examples that contribute to the quality of life, serve as a role model, inspiration and idea for all and as such are very important for improving the position of people with disabilities in the efforts to achieve a more inclusive society in Serbia. Likewise, the objective of the Award is to continuously impact awareness raising and send a strong message on the importance of accessibility, promoting the principle Design for all and creating environment and services that may be used by all female and male citizens i.e. an inclusive environment accessible to everyone.