Political Risk:
Moderate
Score:
51/100
Defence and Security Policy and Policy Transparency
Q1
58/100
Is there formal provision for effective and independent legislative scrutiny of defence policy?
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Parliamentary scrutiny over defence policy is envisaged through a set of legal documents, starting with the Constitution of the Republic of Serbia that places…
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The National Assembly (NA) does exercise formal powers in the domain of defence and security sector oversight. Laws dealing with security and defence, as…
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Although there is no clear evidence of direct influence over MPs, obstruction of the NA’s work by the ruling majority indicates the high impact…
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Q2
25/100
Does the country have an identifiable and effective parliamentary defence and security committee (or similar such organisations) to exercise oversight?
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The National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia has two committees engaged in the oversight over the defence issues, the Defence and Internal Affairs…
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The proportion of MPs with relevant expertise in the security and defence sector is very small. Within the SSCC, three MPs have defence and…
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The Committees’ agenda reflects the daily activities of the entire Parliament and the executive, thus, the defence and security policies are reviewed on a…
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The committees convene regularly. Since the beginning of the current convocation in 2016, there have been 16 DIAC and 21 SSCC sessions. Both committees…
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In the previous two convocations, the National Assembly did not conduct any kind of long-term investigations and delegated these tasks to an external body…
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There is no evidence that the influence of the DIAC or the SSCC is visible in the work of the MoD, MOI or BIA.…
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Q3
38/100
Is the country’s national defence policy or national security strategy debated and publicly available?
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A comprehensive debate on defence policy and national security strategy is not present in the public, certain aspects of the defence policy are rather…
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Discussion of the defence policy or security strategy is superficial without discussion on key issues. Considering the time allotted, public discussions cannot reach the…
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The public is consulted in the process of shaping defence policies only formally. During the official discussion on strategic documents, faced with a series…
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Interested citizens, experts and civil society have been completely excluded from the drafting process of strategic documents. Since November 2016, an interministerial working group,…
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Q4
42/100
Do defence and security institutions have a policy, or evidence, of openness towards civil society organisations (CSOs) when dealing with issues of corruption?
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There is no evidence of an official policy within the MoD which would promote cooperation with civil society on corruption issues. However, MoD and…
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Most recent amendments to the Law on Defence missed the opportunity to remove disputable provisions, which open up the space for misuse and further…
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Under the mandate of the current minister (from June 2017), the cooperation of the MoD and SAF with civil society on corruption issues has…
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Q5
75/100
Has the country signed up to the following international anti-corruption instruments: UNCAC and the OECD Convention?
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Q6
50/100
Is there evidence of regular, active public debate on issues of defence? If yes, does the government participate in this debate?
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Debate on important defence issues is present in the public but can rather be characterized as individual efforts of interested actors, than continuous discussion…
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Dialogue between civil society and the MoD is not systematic. It is mostly initiated by the civil society organisations which maintain the discussion on…
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Q7
63/100
Does the country have an openly stated and effectively implemented anti-corruption policy for the defence sector?
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The Serbian Government has adopted a National Anti-Corruption Strategy for the period 2013-2018, as well as an action plan for its implementation and, has…
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Integrity plans are partially implemented, mostly the activities aimed at organizational and legal changes. Some of the goals and activities in the integrity plans…
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Q8
38/100
Are there independent, well-resourced, and effective institutions within defence and security tasked with building integrity and countering corruption?
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There are several bodies tasked with tackling corruption within the MoD and SAF. The Military Security Agency (MSA) has the competence to detect, investigate…
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The independence of these bodies is disputable since they are directly accountable to the executive, i.e. to agencies’ chiefs when it comes to internal…
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There is not enough information to score this indicator. The effectiveness of these bodies is difficult to evaluate since the MoD itself does not…
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Q9
NS/100
Does the public trust the institutions of defence and security to tackle the issue of bribery and corruption in their establishments?
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This indicator is not assigned a score in the GDI. According to a series of public opinion surveys, the SAF enjoy a high level…
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Q10
67/100
Are there regular assessments of the areas of greatest corruption risk for ministry and armed forces personnel, and are the findings used as inputs to the anti-corruption policy?
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Risk assessments are carried out by the Military Security Agency (MSA). Organisational units do not conduct their own risk assessments. The MoD is also…
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The MSA regularly conducts risk assessments based on which annual integrity plans are being developed. Evaluation of corruption risks carried out in cooperation with…
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Results of the risk assessments are used to develop annual integrity plans for 13 institutions within the defence system. Integrity plans cover six areas:…
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Defence Budgets
Q11
25/100
Does the country have a process for acquisition planning that involves clear oversight, and is it publicly available?
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The acquisition planning process in the defence system is developed within the Public Procurement Law (PPL) and a series of specific bylaws. PPL obliges…
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The MoD regularly publishes annual public procurement plans. Besides data on the type of the procurement and tentative dates, since 2016, plans encompass the…
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Besides the DIAC, which discusses public procurement plans very superficially, there is no external oversight over the procurement planning process. The committee receives and…
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Q12
50/100
Is the defence budget transparent, showing key items of expenditure? And it is provided to the legislature in a timely fashion?
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Structure of the defence budget has significantly improved in comparison to the period when the last assessment was conducted. From 2015, budget funds for…
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Budget proposals have not reached the responsible parliamentary committees on time in the past few years. The executive has adopted budget proposals in late…
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Q13
50/100
Is there a legislative committee (or other appropriate body) responsible for defence budget scrutiny and analysis in an effective way?
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The Defence and Internal Affairs Committee (DIAC) has the formal powers to oversee the defence budget planning and spending, whereas the Security Services Control…
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Since the last parliamentary elections in 2016, neither the DIAC nor the SSCC has deliberated on the budget proposals or their realisations plans [1,…
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Q14
50/100
Is the approved defence budget made publicly available? In practice, can citizens, civil society, and the media obtain detailed information on the defence budget?
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The defence budget is regularly published as a part of the state budget. The budget has been separated into programmes since 2015. The budget…
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The budget comes with the programme information consisting of justifications of programs, projects and activities, along with set targets and indicators for the next…
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The Law on Free Access to Information of Public Interest guarantees the citizens’ right to access information of public interest [1]. The MoD does…
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Q15
83/100
Are sources of defence income other than from central government allocation (from equipment sales or property disposal, for example) published and scrutinised?
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MoD income is published within the general national budget, but only in an aggregated form, without specifying the sources. The income sources are divided…
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There are active and independent mechanisms of scrutiny: the MoD Internal Audit unit and the State Audit Institution (SAI). In 2016 the SAI performed…
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There are no published reports on audits performed by the Internal Audit Unit and no further audits performed by SAI since 2016. All BCSP…
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Q16
25/100
Is there an effective internal audit process for defence ministry expenditure (that is, for example, transparent, conducted by appropriately skilled individuals, and subject to parliamentary oversight)?
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The Internal Audit Unit performs tasks of organizing, implementing and reporting on the results of internal audit within all organizational units of the MoD.…
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The internal audit results are contained in the quarterly reports on the MoD’s work submitted to the DIAC; however, they have not been thoroughly…
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There are no records of external scrutiny over the work of the Internal Audit Unit by the State Audit Institution [1].
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There is no evidence that internal audit findings influence executive decisions.
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Q17
81/100
Is there effective and transparent external auditing of military defence expenditure?
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The State Audit Institution (SAI) is in charge of external auditing of the military defence expenditure since the MoD is one of the direct…
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The SAI is an independent and autonomous oversight body. Its council consists of five members elected and dismissed by the National Assembly [1]. There…
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The State Audit Institution publishes both regular and special reports on its website in a transparent and timely manner [1]. The SAI’s annual reports…
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The SAI conducted an audit report for MoD for 2018 [1] and made three recommendations that are classified as medium priority. The MoD acted…
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Nexus of Defence and National Assets
Q18
35/100
Is there evidence that the country’s defence institutions have controlling or financial interests in businesses associated with the country’s natural resource exploitation and, if so, are these interests publicly stated and subject to scrutiny?
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There are no provisions within the existing legislation that would prohibit defence institutions from natural resource exploitation [1, 2, 3, 4, 5].
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The Ministry of Defence owns hunting grounds and natural parks that can be regarded as “natural resource exploitation”. Namely MoD has ownership over the…
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There is no evidence of individual personnel being involved in business relating to Serbia’s natural resource exploitation.
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There is generally no public information on relevant activities, plans and other topics related to natural resources. The Ministry of Defence does not perceive…
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There is no special interest of the public and the parliament for the issues of monitoring the work of military facilities that are related…
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Organised Crime
Q19
63/100
Is there evidence, for example through media investigations or prosecution reports, of a penetration of organised crime into the defence and security sector? If no, is there evidence that the government is alert and prepared for this risk?
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The risk of organised crime penetration in the defence sector is fairly low. In the past three years, there was only one case, which…
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MoD and SAF officials publicly acknowledge and commit to tackling organised crime, though only superficially, along with other risks and challenges to security, such…
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Q20
67/100
Is there policing to investigate corruption and organised crime within the defence services and is there evidence of the effectiveness of this policing?
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The Military Security Agency (MSA) is tasked with investigating and collecting evidence in corruption and organised crime offences [1]. Moreover, the Military Police (MP)…
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The MSA and the MIA are administrative bodies within the MoD, directly accountable to the minister of defence, hence their independence is disputed. The…
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The effectiveness of the MSA and the MP in tackling corruption and organised crime is difficult to assess due to the limited publicly available…
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Control of Intelligence Services
Q21
50/100
Are the policies, administration, and budgets of the intelligence services subject to effective and independent oversight?
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The Law on the Basic Regulation of the Security Services gives the mandate to the authorized committee of the National Assembly to conduct supervision…
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The SSCC assembles regularly (20 sessions during the current convocation) and formally exercises its powers by discussing and adopting draft laws, reviewing the budget…
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Q22
33/100
Are senior positions within the intelligence services filled on the basis of objective selection criteria, and are appointees subject to investigation of their suitability and prior conduct?
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The SIA Director is appointed and recalled by the government. The Law on SIA does not provide any criteria the government should be led…
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Besides omitting precise criteria for security agencies’ chiefs selection, the legal framework also fails to envisage external oversight over the process. Hence, the executive…
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Candidates for senior positions within security services have to pass a general security check conducted by the SIA or MSA, as all the employees…
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Export Controls
Q23
58/100
Does the government have a well-scrutinised process for arms export decisions that aligns with Articles 7.1.iv, 11.5, and 15.6 of the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT)?
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Serbia signed the Arms Trade Treaty and ratified it in December 2014 [1].
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There was a case in 2016, which may suggest a breach of the ATT provisions. A group of investigative journalists exposed how weapons from…
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These is no robust scrutiny over upcoming arms exports either in the National Assembly plenary sessions or in the relevant committee sittings [1, 2].
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Lobbying in Defence
The Law on Lobbying (1) has been in force since August 2018, but there are significant limitations. The law refers only to the influence…
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The Law on Lobbying (1) does not stipulate an obligation for public officials in defence institutions to register contacts with lobbyists.
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The Law on Lobbying stipulates a mandatory registration system for lobbyists, however it is not clear whether it allows for public diclosure of a…
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The Law on Lobbying (1) stipulates a strict oversight procedure that includes: a. a mandated and well-resourced oversight entity for oversight of lobbying, b.…
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