November 30, 2009

The dominant issue of today’s media is the decision on visa liberalization for Serbia, made in Brussels today by EU justice and interior ministers. Another topic covered by the media is Serbia’s forthcoming candidature for EU membership. More in the PRESS REVIEW, prepared by Zorica Regeljac.

VEČERNJE NOVOSTI writes about the visa liberalization decision, which takes effect on December 19, St Nicholas Day. Another step towards EU integrations should be the unfreezing of the Interim Trade Agreement and the beginning of the ratification of the Stabilization and Association Agreement. As soon as the Interim Agreement is unfrozen, Serbia will file for EU candidature. Meanwhile, the European Commission is to draw up an opinion on Serbia’s candidature and ratify the SAA in member-states’ parliaments. When the two processes are over, Serbia could commence pre-accession negotiations.
POLITIKA covers predictions of a date of EU admission. Those who believe that could ensue comparatively soon count primarily on political will, which played an important role in the case of some current member-states. Others believe the process will last longer, due to the complex procedure, which entails  not only the fulfillment of certain prerequisites on Serbia’s part, but also a series of unanimous decisions by the EU, says Milan Pajević, an advisor of the Centre for International and Security Affairs. Predrag Simić, a professor of the Faculty of Political Sciences in Belgrade, emphasized an earlier date is important for Serbia, due to mobilization and the fulfillment of a criteria that is not mentioned anywhere, but matters most and that is political will. It applied, for instance, in the case of two Balkan countries, the newest EU member-states, Romania and Bulgaria. That was, above all, a political decision, as was the admission of as many as ten countries to the EU in 2004.
DANAS daily writes that the first quantities of 140,000 doses of vaccines against virus A H1N1 have arrived in the Institute for Virology and Immunology „Torlak“.Branislav Tiodorović, a member of the Working Group for Monitoring New Flu pandemics, said the Serbian Agency for Medicines and Medicaments would check into the vaccine quality and they will be distributed all over Serbia only with an affirmative certificate. The vaccines, produced by Swiss firm Novartis, are to be examined in 10 to 15 days. The procedure has been curtailed as at issue are not unknown, uncertified or unregistered vaccines, he says and adds another shipment of 500,000 doses is expected. The priorities include chronic patients, pregnant women and children over 6 months. In the second round, those on whom the functioning of society as a whole depends will be inoculated and in the third round other, healthy citizens will be inoculated.