Changes from resolution motion to resolution motion joint

AddedW. whereas over the past decade since President Vučić came to power, there has been a continuous erosion of media freedom in Serbia, characterised by political pressure, threats and even physical attacks against journalists; whereas Reporters Without Borders has placed Serbia among the lowest in Europe in its World Press Freedom Index, with the country dropping 12 places to 91 in 2023;

Removed4. Condemns the lack of prosecutions and sanctions related to criminal offences during the elections, including serious allegations of unlawful manipulation of the voter registry and voting rights, pressure and intimidation against citizens and election candidates, cases of corruption, the forging of citizens’ signatures, clientelism, the illegitimate and unlawful abuse of citizen data, abuses of state office and a lack of effective mechanisms to prevent incumbents from gaining an unfair institutional advantage in elections;

AddedX. whereas the rule of law and the proper functioning of Serbia’s democratic institutions remain a core challenge for Serbia’s EU accession process;

Removed5. Urges the Serbian authorities to investigate, prosecute and bring to justice those responsible for criminal offences during the elections;

Added1. Deplores the fact that the Serbian parliamentary and local elections held on 17 December 2023 deviated from international standards and Serbia’s commitments to free and fair elections, owing to the incumbents’ persistent and systematic abuse of institutions and media in order to gain an unfair and undue advantage; considers that these elections cannot be deemed to have been held in fair conditions; is alarmed by reports of the widespread and systematic scale of fraud that compromised the integrity of the elections in Serbia;

Removed6. Condemns the attacks by government officials, notably Prime Minister Brnabić and President Vučić, on election observers, including Members of the European Parliament; is deeply concerned by the attempts to discredit and intimidate the observers; urges the Serbian authorities to take all necessary steps to avoid any further disinformation campaigns against election observers and to establish conditions that allow national and international election observers to effectively do their work, as well as to protect them from any violence, threats, retaliation, adverse discrimination, pressure or any other arbitrary action as a consequence of their legitimate exercise of their rights and freedoms;

Added2. Notes that the I-EOM stated that the election was conducted smoothly, but that the day was marked by numerous procedural deficiencies, including the inconsistent application of safeguards during voting and counting, frequent instances of overcrowding, breaches of voting secrecy, and numerous instances of group voting; expresses its serious concern over those irregularities and the overall election environment, which fell below the standards expected of an EU candidate country; reminds the Serbian authorities that the proper functioning of Serbia’s democratic institutions is at the core of Serbia’s EU accession process and the EU accession methodology;

Removed7. Stresses the need for an independent international investigation into election irregularities, supported by the EU; urges the Commission to launch an initiative to send an expert mission to Serbia, possibly including experts from the ODIHR, the Venice Commission and the Council of Europe, to assess the situation as regards the recent elections and post-election developments in an effort to facilitate the preconditions for establishing a necessary societal dialogue to attempt to restore the public’s trust and confidence in institutions; urges the Commission to report to the European Parliament on its findings;

Added3. Notes with serious concern the extensive evidence collected by the international and domestic observers showing activities leading up to and during election day that may have altered the outcome of the elections and may have critically impacted the results of the Belgrade municipal elections, in particular, and seriously undermined the legitimacy of the parliamentary elections;

Removed8. Urges the Serbian authorities to restore the electorate’s confidence to the entire process, lay out fully transparent election procedures and ensure accountability on the part of authorities, whether they are conducting elections or interfering with them;

Added4. Calls for an independent international investigation by respected international legal experts and institutions into the irregularities of the parliamentary, provincial and municipal elections, with special attention to the elections to the Belgrade City Assembly, as certain allegations, including those regarding organised voter migration at local level, go beyond the scope covered by the OSCE/ODIHR reports; supports the prompt deployment of an ad hoc fact-finding mission to Serbia, with the participation of Parliament;

Removed9. Calls on Serbian authorities to fully and substantially cooperate with the ODIHR, the EU and the Council of Europe and to facilitate an inclusive process to shore up election-related rights and freedoms, institutions and processes, with the participation of domestic election observers and political parties;

Added5. Urges the Commission to launch an initiative to send an expert mission to Serbia to assess the situation as regards the recent elections and post-election developments in an effort to facilitate the preconditions for establishing a necessary societal dialogue to attempt to restore the public’s trust and confidence in institutions, and to assess and address the systemic rule of law issues in Serbia, looking at the example of the ‘Priebe Reports’;

Removed10. Encourages the Serbian authorities to show strong and genuine political will to address key problematic aspects of the electoral process and to properly implement existing legislation and the recommendations issued by the Venice Commission and the ODIHR in their December 2022 joint opinion on further improving the legal framework governing elections, in particular by conducting, in consultation with expert civil society organisations and well ahead of the next elections, full audits of the unified voter register, competing candidates’ access to the media, the enhanced transparency and accountability of campaign finance, measures to tackle pressure on voters and the misuse of administrative resources in order to prevent new irregularities and fraud and to guarantee the democratic functioning of the country;

Added6. Deplores the lack of institutional response to the serious allegations of the incumbents’ involvement in electoral manipulation and abuse, which contributes to an atmosphere of impunity and ensures the continuation of these practices; Notes, with concern, that some of the election irregularities leading up to the December 2023 elections constitute potential breaches of Serbian law and its Constitution; stresses that, if allowed to persist without any repercussions, this practice will continue to undermine trust in Serbia’s electoral process and institutions, irrevocably hindering democratic rule and further European integration; stresses the importance of thoroughly investigating all election-related complaints, including the recent request to annul the Belgrade City Assembly elections of 17 December 2023, which was filed with the Constitutional Court by an official of the ‘Serbia against Violence’ coalition;

Removed11. Calls on the Serbian authorities to make meaningful and credible changes to the country’s election laws to prevent the organised bussing of voters from abroad;

Added7. Deplores the lack of prosecutions and sanctions related to offences during the elections, including serious allegations of unlawful manipulation of the voter register and voting rights, pressure and intimidation against citizens and election candidates, cases of corruption, the forging of citizens’ signatures, clientelism, the illegitimate and unlawful abuse of citizen data, abuses of state office and a lack of effective mechanisms to prevent incumbents from gaining an unfair institutional advantage in elections;

Removed12. Condemns the absence of media pluralism during the election campaign and the widespread unethical and biased media reporting in favour of the incumbents; condemns the President of Serbia’s overwhelming public exposure before and during the campaign, as it erased the lines between the institution of the president, the state and the political party in power;

Added8. Urges the Serbian authorities to investigate, prosecute and bring to justice those responsible for any criminal offences during the elections, and any attacks on students;

Removed13. Strongly regrets that the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Media neglected its obligations under the law to scrutinise the campaign in the media, report on its findings and sanction media outlets that breached the law, spread hate speech or violated journalistic standards;

Added9. Condemns the orchestrated attacks by Serbian officials on election observers, including Members of the European Parliament and calls for a return to respectful and constructive discourse, emphasising the importance of mutual respect in the democratic process; is deeply concerned by the attempts to discredit and intimidate the observers; urges the Serbian authorities to take all necessary steps to avoid any further disinformation campaigns against election observers and to establish conditions that allow national and international election observers to effectively do their work, as well as to protect them from any violence, threats, retaliation, adverse discrimination, pressure or any other arbitrary action as a consequence of their legitimate exercise of their rights and freedoms; commends the work of the domestic observers from the Center for Research, Transparency and Accountability (CRTA) and the Centre for Free Elections and Democracy (CeSID);

Removed14. Encourages the Serbian authorities to ensure that the country’s independent and supervisory institutions, especially the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Media and the Agency for the Prevention of Corruption, play a proactive role in creating the conditions for fair elections;

Added10. Is concerned about the ‘passivisation’ of the residential addresses of certain categories of citizens, including in Belgrade and southern Serbia, which deprives them of the right to vote; calls on the responsible authorities to remedy these serious violations of electoral rights without further delay;

Added11. Urges the Republic of Serbia to address concerns about the participation of national minorities in the electoral process, ensuring the consistent application of criteria for minority status and addressing vulnerabilities to pressure and vote buying;

Added12. Calls on the Serbian authorities to provide institutional solutions to overcome the current problems; calls for the Serbian Parliament and Government to make every effort to function effectively, free from the constant cycle of campaigns and frequent snap elections;

Added13. Urges the Serbian authorities to restore the electorate’s confidence in the entire process, lay out fully transparent election procedures and ensure accountability on the part of authorities, whether they are conducting elections or interfering with them; calls on Serbian authorities to fully and substantially cooperate with the ODIHR, the EU and the Council of Europe and to facilitate an inclusive process to shore up election-related rights and freedoms, institutions and processes, with the participation of domestic election observers and political parties; welcomes any genuine steps in this direction;

Added14. Notes, with concern, that Serbia has not implemented many long-standing OSCE/ODIHR recommendations on major issues in the electoral process, despite being repeatedly urged to do so, including by the Commission; takes note of the recent amendments that selectively addressed some of the previous OSCE/ODIHR and Venice Commission recommendations, notably those referring to the legal framework for election campaign finance;

Added15. Looks forward to the final report of the OSCE/ODIHR I-EOM; urges Serbia to implement the recommendations set out in the joint opinion of the Venice Commission and the OSCE/ODIHR of 19 December 2022 on the constitutional and legal framework governing the functioning of democratic institutions in Serbia, in consultation with expert civil society organisations and well ahead of the next elections, in order to prevent new irregularities and fraud while guaranteeing the democratic functioning of the country, in particular those regarding the competing candidates’ access to the media, the enhanced transparency and accountability of campaign finance, measures to tackle pressure on voters and the misuse of administrative resources;

Added16. Calls on Serbia to implement the OSCE/ODIHR recommendation to conduct a comprehensive audit of the unified voter register to address concerns about accuracy, including allegations of voter migration and entries of deceased persons; is concerned about over allegations that the unified voter register has already recorded significant increases of voters in cities where local elections will take place later in 2024;

Added17. Urges the REC to take the necessary steps to address concerns about the transparency and efficiency of its functioning, including the timely publication of monitoring results during the campaign period;

Added18. Condemns the absence of media pluralism during the election campaign, as well as disinformation and the widespread unethical and biased media reporting in favour of the incumbents; notes, with concern, that a large number of media outlets are influenced or controlled by the government, which resulted in an uneven playing field for opposition candidates during the campaign; condemns the attacks instigated by media outlets close to the government against critical journalists; deplores the President of Serbia’s overwhelming public exposure before and during the campaign, as it erased the lines between the institution of the president, the state and the political party in power;

Added19. Is concerned that despite new laws on electronic media and on public information and media, the conditions and pluralism in the media have deteriorated; strongly regrets that the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Media (REM) neglected its obligations under the law to scrutinise the campaign in the media, report on its findings and sanction media outlets that breached the law, spread hate speech or violated journalistic standards; notes, with concern, that the REM has only published monitoring results for the public broadcaster and private cable channels, but not for private national channels close to the ruling party;

Added20. Expresses its concerns about cases of abusive attacks and language combined with harassment against journalists, human rights activists and civil society organisations, in some instances coming from government officials, particularly prior to the elections; urges the Serbian authorities to counter foreign interference and disinformation campaigns, to strongly improve the protection of independent journalism and to ensure a transparent media landscape; underlines that the EU institutions must do more to ensure that the rights and freedoms of Serbian journalists and media are protected; points out that access to pre-accession funding should be used as a tool to stop the media freedom situation from deteriorating further;

Added21. Calls for a reform of the effectiveness of the campaign oversight mechanisms, including of the Agency for the Prevention of Corruption and the ad hoc Committee for Campaign Oversight, to ensure timely and transparent handling of complaints related to the misuse of public resources;

Added22. Highlights that Serbia, as a candidate country for EU membership, lacks sufficiently implemented basic EU and international democratic standards; calls on the Serbian authorities to ensure that there are enough democratic guarantees in place to hold the next regular local elections in 2024, as well as future elections;

23. Notes that all Serbian Parliaments in the past 12 years but one were dissolved early and that the continuation of unnecessary snap elections undermines political stability; underlines that constant early elections, permanent campaign mode and long delays in forming governments do not contribute to efficient democratic governance of the country, but instead weaken the parliament and lead to a lack of parliamentary legislative oversight and legitimacy;

Change 5

Changed16.24. IsUnderlines the importance of freedom of speech and acknowledges that everyone has the right to express their views and participate in peaceful protests; condemns, in this context, the disproportionate use of police violence against peaceful demonstrators protesting against electoral fraud; is concerned about allegations that agent provocateurs infiltrated the protests to trigger the intervention of the police; is concerned about assessments that some participants in the protest on 24 December 2023 received disproportionately harsh treatment by the police and the judiciary;judiciary, condemnsin thestark excessivecontrast useto the practices of the Serbian police forcein duringprevious protests in the protests;country; urges the EU Delegationand toMember SerbiaStates’ todiplomatic continuemissions to monitorcontinue monitoring the ongoing legal cases related to the protests;

Change 6

Changed17.25. Strongly condemns the Serbian authorities’ unsubstantiated claims that EU Member States were involved in organising post-election protests; regrets that the protests have been used as an excuse to spread anti-EU narratives in mediathe outletsmedia close to the ruling party; notes that, following the elections, the President of Serbia announced that he would publish a letter on ‘brutal interference in the elections by an important country’ by the end of 2023, which never happened;

Change 7

Changed18. Calls26. onRegrets the Commission to avoid any further policylack of appeasement towards Serbia; expressesvocal concerncriticism aboutby the Commission’sCommission, lacknotably ofby vocalthe criticismCommissioner towardsfor Serbia,Enlargement, despiteregarding the numerous allegations of voter fraud,fraud in the Serbian elections, and calls on the Commission to address the shortcomings that have led to thethese allegations as part of the accessionwithout process;delay;

Change 8

Changed19.27. Calls,Reiterates inits thisposition context,that accession negotiations with Serbia should advance only if the country makes significant progress on its EU-related reforms, including full implementation of the recommendations of the OSCE/ODIHR and Venice Commission; calls on the Commission and the Council to freezeapply allstrict conditionality; calls on the Commission to follow up thoroughly on the reports of the European Court of Auditors and to immediately start the audit of the funding provided to Serbiathe Serbian Government under the Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance III (IPA III) and other financial instruments; underlines that if the Serbian authorities are unwilling to initiate an independent international investigationimplement intokey election irregularitiesrecommendations or if the findings of this investigation indicate that the Serbian authorities were directly involved in the alleged voter fraud;fraud, calls for the suspension of EU funding on the basis of severe breaches of the rule of law in connection with Serbia’s elections;

Change 9

Removed20. Reiterates its position that accession negotiations with Serbia should advance only if the country aligns with EU sanctions against Russia, makes significant progress on its EU-related reforms and fully implements the recommendations of the ODIHR and the Venice Commission;

Added28. Undertakes to closely monitor post-electoral developments in Serbia and commits to supporting reforms that strengthen democracy and help Serbia to advance on the path towards EU accession; stresses that it has always endeavoured to support political pluralism and the reinforcement of an inclusive election environment in Serbia through all its activities, in particular through the inter-party dialogue and the parliamentary dialogue process; underlines the importance of continuing the inter-party dialogue and the parliamentary dialogue process; calls for the EU to co-facilitate an internal and meaningful dialogue in Serbia between the government and the opposition in order to overcome the current climate of deep political polarisation; considers Parliament, against this background, to be the most suitable institution to act as a constructive facilitator;

Removed21. Urges the Serbian authorities to counter foreign interference and disinformation campaigns, to strongly improve the protection of independent journalism and to ensure a transparent media landscape;

Added29. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the President of the European Council, the Commission, the Vice-President of the Commission / High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, the governments and parliaments of the Member States, the President, Government and National Assembly of Serbia, the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

Removed22. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the President of the European Council, the Commission, the Vice-President of the Commission / High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, the governments and parliaments of the Member States and the President, Government and National Assembly of Serbia.