Conference on Serbia’s participation in EU civilian missions

Ambassador Branimir Filipovic, Acting Assistant Foreign Minister for security policy participated in the panel “Serbia and Development of a System for Participation in EU Civilian Missions and Operations”, held within the Conference on Serbia’s Future Involvement in EU Civilian Missions organized by the International and Security Affairs Centre (ISAC Fund).

In addition to Ambassador Filipovic, the panellists included Colonel Katarina Strbac, PhD, Director of Directorate for European Integration and Project Management, Defence Policy Sector, Ministry of Defence; Vladimir Ateljevic, Advisor to the Minister of European Integration and member of the Negotiating Team for Chapter 31 – Foreign, Security and Defence Policy, while the Director of ISAC Fund, Nikola Petrovic, had the role of moderator.

The panel presented the activities carried out so far, showing a high level of inter-sectoral coordination, by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Defence, Ministry of European Integration and other state bodies in the context of developing a legal framework and capacities for participation in civilian missions, as part of the important activities of the Republic of Serbia in the framework of Chapter 31 – Foreign, Security and Defence Policy, but also as a demonstration of Serbia’s foreign policy positioning as a reliable partner, ready to share responsibility for the maintenance of peace and stability at the international level.

The Conference, held on 14-15 December 2017, as part of the project “Development of Serbia’s National Capabilities for Civilian Contributions to Peace Support Operations”, with support of the Czech Development Agency, dealt with the issues related to building Serbia’s national capacities for civilian contribution to peace support operations and civilian crisis management, focusing in particular on an analysis and the operation of a system of secondment of civilian experts to EU-mandated peace missions, past experiences of particular civilian experts on secondment to civilian missions, and also the results achieved so far by the Republic of Serbia in this field.