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The Government of the Republic of Serbia

In the service of citizens

Memorandum for strengthening legal aspects of land reform signed

Belgrade, 18 July 2006

A Memorandum of understanding was signed today at the Serbian government whose aim is to strengthen legal aspects of the land reform in Serbia, with a special emphasis on the privatisation of the city building land and the laws on construction and land use planning.

The Memorandum was signed by ministers of international economic relations and capital investment Milan Parivodic and Velimir Ilic, Austrian Ambassador to Belgrade Gerhard Jandl, head of the Belgrade office of the German Organisation for Technical Cooperation (GTZ) Marin Trojanov and deputy head of mission of the Swiss Embassy Raffael Vonovier.

Speaking at a press conference held after the signing of the memorandum, Ilic said that with this document Serbia enters the system of legal regulation of the city building land with the assistance of leading countries in that field - Germany, Austria and Switzerland, using a practice that is common in the European Union.

He said that there have been many problems concerning investments because the status of the city building land was not resolved. But with new regulations, the legalisation of illegally built facilities will be speeded up and it will be easier to get banking guarantees for loans.

Parivodic said that with this memorandum the communist concept of ownership over city building land is terminated, in which the state was the main monopolist, which does not exist in any developed and democratic state.

That hinders the development of the market economy, which has been the main problem in the Serbian economic system, Parivodic said.

Due to all those inefficiencies, the ministries of finance, international economic relations and capital investments launched a joint initiative to seek the assistance of three legal systems that are similar to the Serbian one in order to assist this substantial reform and project worth €800,000.

The Minister of International Economic Relations said that this is a model of how crucial issues in a state should be resolved and announced that on November 1 an expert working group will submit draft laws with follow-up notes on the privatisation of building land, legalisation, urban planning, as well as on construction laws and efficient issue of building licences.

Austrian Ambassador Gerhard Jandl said that this document is important because it leads to the establishment of legal security, guarantees ownership over private real estate, improves the investment climate, as well as the rule of law which will bring Serbia closer to the European Union.