Assembly debates judicial laws as two issues stay open
As deputies debate the revised judicial laws, the Venice Commission says Serbia has implemented seven of nine recommendations, but two substantive points remain unresolved.
- The seventh extraordinary session of the Assembly opened on June 17 at 11 a.m., called at the request of 101 deputies, with 32 items on the agenda.
- The agenda includes five judicial laws, among them laws on public prosecution, on judges, and on the High Prosecutorial Council.
- The Venice Commission judged that Serbia has implemented seven of nine recommendations.
- Two recommendations remain unresolved, the status of prosecutors in the organized crime unit and the independence of the cybercrime division.
The seventh extraordinary session of the National Assembly opened on June 17 at 11 a.m., called at the request of 101 deputies, with 32 items on the agenda. At the center of the debate sits a set of judicial laws known publicly as the “Mrdic laws,” after Serbian Progressive Party deputy Ugljesa Mrdic, on whose proposal the original amendments were adopted in January. The trigger for the new debate is a follow-up opinion from the Venice Commission, the Council of Europe’s advisory body on constitutional questions, published just before the session.
The Commission found that Serbia has implemented seven of nine recommendations from its earlier opinion. On a formal count, that is a strong result. But the two remaining points are not procedural details. They go to the core of why the package was contested from the start: who controls the most sensitive parts of the prosecution service, and how well shielded they are from political pressure.
The agenda covers laws on public prosecution, on judges, on the High Prosecutorial Council, on the seats and territories of courts and prosecutors’ offices, and on cybercrime. This is constitutional matter that was supposed to round off the 2022 judicial reform, and that instead became a recurring fault line between the government and the opposition.
What exactly does the Venice Commission say is unresolved?
The first open point is recommendation seven, and it concerns people. The Commission notes that two of eleven public prosecutors, whose temporary assignments to the Prosecutor’s Office for Organized Crime were ended early, have not been returned to their posts. In plain terms, the staffing of one of the country’s most powerful prosecutorial units was reshaped so that certain prosecutors are no longer there, and the mechanism meant to correct that has not taken effect. For critics, this is the heart of the objection: a personnel intervention hard to tell apart from selection by loyalty.
The second point, recommendation eight, concerns an institution. The Special Department for Cybercrime, in the Commission’s assessment, lacks sufficient structural and operational independence. That department handles a growing share of cases that touch public communication, data, and digital traces, so the question of its autonomy is not technical. It determines how freely the body can act when a case crosses the interests of those who hold power.
The opposition argues that the laws, even in their revised form, are a club for retaliation, a tool to keep the prosecution on a short leash. The government counters that the laws protect the Constitution, and that seven implemented recommendations prove good faith and a European course. Between those two claims stands the Venice Commission’s opinion, which does not settle the political argument but gives it a measurable frame: two recommendations, clearly numbered, still awaiting an answer.
Why does this session matter more than it looks?
Judicial laws rarely draw wide public attention, because they feel abstract. This set is an exception, because it carries a personal nickname and because an international body’s assessment trails it. If the Assembly adopts the laws without changes addressing recommendations seven and eight, Serbia stays in a position where it has formally met most of the bar while substantively sidestepping the hard part. If the points are built in, the government loses the argument that the opposition merely obstructs, and the opposition loses the argument that this is pure retaliation.
Under the agenda, the debate on all five laws will run jointly, which means the vote will likely come as a package. That simplifies the procedure but makes it harder for the public to separate which law drew how much support and on what grounds. In the coming days the key question will not be whether the laws pass, since parliamentary arithmetic favors the government, but whether the text that emerges closes the two remaining gaps or leaves them for some later round.
Do you think the Assembly should postpone the vote until both remaining Venice Commission points are resolved?
