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The Government of the Republic of Serbia

In the service of citizens

Education priority area of funding for national minorities

Belgrade, 5 February 2020

Prime Minister Ana Brnabic today presided over the ninth session of the Council for National Minorities, which adopted the proposal to make education the priority area of financing for 2020 from the Budget Fund for National Minorities of the Ministry of Public Administration and Local Self-Government, for which RSD 30,000,000 was provided.

Representatives of national councils of national minorities raised issues, including tardiness in translating textbooks into some of the languages of national minorities.

Brnabic pointed out that a number of activities were carried out and cooperation was intensified with the countries of origin of national minorities in many areas since the previous session, but that there is still room for improvement of the position of national minorities.

She also emphasised that Serbia is among the top countries, not only in Europe but also in the world, by the extremely high standards it has provided for representatives of all national minorities living in its territory.

Deputy Chairman of the Council and Minister of Public Administration and Local Self-Government Branko Ruzic informed the members of the Council on what has been done in the past year, and in particular on activities related to the implementation of new legal solutions.

The Minister, among other things, outlined what has been done to ensure the issuance of bilingual statements with all information in the language and script of national minorities and birth registration, as well as the establishment of the single administrative point.

The Catalogue of the most common Albanian names with transcription into Serbian language and the Cyrillic script was drafted and presented in December last year, which will contribute to the entry of personal data of citizens from the Albanian community into official records kept by public administration bodies, he said.

Speaking about the allocation of funds from the Budget Fund for National Minorities, Ruzic said that a total of 372 applications have been submitted to the competition last year, and that the funds were approved for the implementation of 91 programmes and projects that contribute to the presentation and promotion of cultural heritage, while preparations for the call for this year’s proposals are underway.