While the Yugoslav Federal Constitution establishes a right to environmental information, the Republic of Serbia Constitution does not. The Republic of Serbia's Constitution is not harmonized with the Yugoslav Federal Constitution because the Republic Constitution was written before the Federal Constitution. However, the right to access to environmental information in Serbia is granted instead by the Republic of Serbia Law on Environmental Protection (Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia 66/91, with amendments 83/92, 53/93, 67/93, 48/94 and 53/95). Before passage of this law, about 300 different statutes and regulations controlled environmental protection in Serbia. However, most of the provisions on environmental protection appeared in the Law on Planing and Organizing of the Space and in the Law on Nature Protection. Still, experts agreed that those acts were not synchronized enough and even contrary in some cases. In addition, many of the penalties set forth in the legislation were not tough enough to encourage compliance with the law. The new law on environmental protection was passed to eliminate the confusion caused by the previously diverse legal footing.
Information is only required by law to be delivered through the media. According to Article 3 of the federal law and Article 2 of the Serbian law, dissemination of public information may be carried out through newspapers, magazines, reviews, radio, television press agency, audio-visual and others mass media.
Timeliness, objectivity, professionalism, completeness and authenticity of the public information are one of the basic human rights. However, no regulation on the quality of information exists in the Federal Constitution. The Serbian Constitution (Article 46, Paragraph 7) and the Law on Public Information in Serbia (Article 13, paragraphs 1 and 2) do regulate the means of public information, and state that these media must inform the public truthfully, promptly and objectively. The same is stated in Article 13 of the Law on Radio and Television in Serbia (1991), which deals with timeliness, objectivity, professionalism, and authenticity in informing the public.
Several types of information are specifically available to the public according to legislation. For example, environmental quality data are public, according to Article 8 of the Law on Environmental Protection in Serbia. The public must be informed about real or potential threats to the environment, and information that is necessary for evaluation of environmental danger and for taking actions to protect the environment and human health cannot be classified.
It is illegal for this type of consumer information to be deemed classified. According to the penalty regulations in Article 109, anyone who refuses to release the necessary information is committing a criminal act for which he or she can be fined and sent to prison for up to five years. This regulation has special provisions for punishing an attempted cover-up of environmental information.
There is no international law ratified with regard to special regulations for disseminating environmental information. Article 9 of the fundamental regulations of the Law on Environmental Protection outlines the foundation of a separate environmental informational system, and according to the transitional and closing regulations (Article 112), the government is obliged to set its program within six months. Such a program was made after a year for the period up to 1995 (Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia, 78/92). This program prescribes the foundation of the national environmental database and the exchange of information with different informational systems sectors, making connections with the international database. The plan also includes establishing a monitoring system, an informational center and a special agency for environmental protection which would run this system. The agency would provide participants and users training and would issue annual reports and working plans. The whole program is not nearly developed enough to be considered a functional subsystem of a global informational system.
The Law on the Informational System of the Republic of Serbia (1996) calls for the foundation of a joint database that would standardize data for all institutions of state administration. Because of the time needed for passing regulations and developing programs, the use of this database and this law is still in the early stages of implementation.
The term environmental information is not explicitly defined in the Law on Environmental Protection, but it is an environmental term. According to the accepted norms and the contents of the Law, we can indirectly define which data are considered environmental information. Article 13 of the law defines "environment" in a broad and anthropocentric, or human-centered, way. The legal definition considers the environment to be not only natural resources (i.e. soil, water, air, forests, flora and fauna) but also values created by people in the working process (i.e. cultural sites, constructions and built structures). The law also considers environment to include the whole of the space in which people live and create and therefore ensures protection from noise, radiation, waste and dangerous substances. Finally, the law regulates finances, the supervision of the inspectors, the complaints procedure and penalties for violations; and it refers to the making of regulations, plans, programs and organizations, including environmental impact assessment.
Conditions for Obtaining the Information
The Constitution of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Articles 44 and 122), the Constitution of the Republic of Serbia (Articles 10 and 48) and the Law on Public Administration of Serbia (Articles 5, 60 and 61) prescribe that the activities of all public authorities of all levels are open to the public, except in cases that are prescribed by law. Public authorities are not required to release information regarding state, military, official or business secrets; and this decision is made by the minister or respective responsible manager. The above-mentioned sections of law also outline the "passive" obligations of public authorities to provide data, information and responses to citizens upon request.
Like public authorities, all private bodies that perform public services are obliged to provide information. The Law on Environmental Protection does not prescribe the way in which citizens and NGOs can request and get environmental information, and the same is true for the time limit and form in which they can get the information.
Businesses are obliged to publish information that is important for relations between the enterprise and its social environment, for example basic market data which authorized economic (registry) courts deliver to the Federal Official Gazette concerning to the legal status, financial, business and environmental impact of the business activities. This obligation is relevant only to large enterprises and has no significant importance in practice.
With regard to the natural environment, Article 6 of the Law on Environmental Protection obliges enterprises to keep recorded data about dangerous, injurious, and waste material they use or release into the environment and to notify the authorized bodies about such materials. Article 86 of the law stipulates that enterprises must inform the public about activities that may lead to an emergency and about the measurements of protection. If the enterprise does not inform the public, the offense is treated as an economic violation.
In the case of a request for an administrative procedure, a public authority is obliged to hand down a decision to a party within one month unless it is necessary to conduct a special investigation procedure. In that case, the limit is two months (Federal Law on General Administrative Procedure, Article 208). If the public authority does not hand down the decision within the prescribed time limit, the party has the right to make a complaint just as if his or her request was rejected. The time limit for lodging complaints is 15 days from the day the decision was handed down (Article 220), and the time limit for handing down the decision about a submitted complaint is two months, unless a special law prescribes a shorter time limit (Article 237).
Article 70 of the Federal Law on General Administrative Procedure regulates inspection of the documents and obtaining information about the procedure. A third party in a case, as well as a party who has a legal interest, has the right to inspect the documents of his or her case and to copy or photocopy them at his or her own expense but under the supervision of an official. The costs of reproducing documents is affordable in most cases, and overall, charges do not present an obstacle to the general access to information.
A party in a case can request orally to see documents, but the third party is obliged, upon the authority's request, to demonstrate legal interest in the case in either oral or written form. The party and the third party with legal interest have the right to be informed about the procedure. If the above-mentioned requests are rejected, the parties can file a complaint within 24 hours, and the complaint must be considered within 24 hours. This right to complain applies to access to documents, to copy or photocopy them and to obtain information about the procedure.
Finally, Article 33 of the Law on Public Information in Serbia requires radio and television organizations to keep informational notes for at least eight days after their proclamation. The organizations must allow the inspection of the notes by anyone interested, and interested persons have the right to make corrections. In this case these organizations must keep informational notes for 30 days.
Refusal to Provide Information
According to the above-mentioned articles of the both constitutions and the of the Law on General Administrative Procedure, information about a public authority's activities can be withheld only in cases prescribed by the law. Article 66 says that the public authorities may ban release of any information that contains national, military, official or business secrets. A minister has, according to the law, discretionary right to ban any information from the sphere of activity of his or her ministry. Article 70 prescribes that the party or the third party with legal interests cannot inspect, copy or photocopy session or voting records, official reports, decision drafts or any other confidential notes that can harm the interests of the public or any of the parties. According to the Federal Law on the Bases of Public Information (Article 2) and the Republic Law on Public Information (Article 11) all public authorities and legal entities are obliged, under the same conditions, to make publicly available all information they have except for information that is secret according to the law. There is no public interest possibility.
The penalty regulations of the two above-mentioned laws (Article 21 and Article 38) prescribe fines for anyone responsible for withholding information without justification. The penalty regulation of the Law on Public Administration (Article 92) also prescribes fines for an enterprise, institution or any other legal entity if it does not allow the inspection of the necessary documents by an official inspector. Preventing citizens from inspecting such documents carries no sanction or fine.
The Serbian Law on Employment in Public Administration of 1993. (Article 58 and 59) treats lack of information about occupational health neglect as a light violation of occupational duties, but refusing to give information or giving incorrect information to public authorities, organizations and citizens is a severe violation. Disciplinary action can be initiated by public authorities against the violators.
Informal Guidelines for Agencies and the Public
There are no general guidelines for public authorities regarding how to provide information and/or environmental information, nor are there guidelines for the public on how to request information.
Specific Institutions/Officials to Provide Information
All ministries, according to their official duty, send information to the Ministry of Information, which then informs the public by presenting the information at press conferences. In addition, the Serbian Ministry of Environmental Protection has one designated official who is responsible for information and marketing and another official responsible for the development of the informational system.
If an Authority Does Not Possess the Information
A public authority does not have any formal obligation to ask another agency for requested information that it does not have. The ministry usually directs the party to the agency, and sometimes provides a contact with the agency. Written requests are usually forwarded to the appropriate agency, and again sometimes the agency that first received the request will give requester a contact within the appropriate agency.
Information Held in Public Registers
Information in public registers is not made available free of charge.
Costs of Obtaining Information
There are no facilities for obtaining copies of information on payment of costs of reproduction and dissemination.
According to the Serbian Law on Public Administration (Article 66), officials must notify the public about activities of public authorities by giving information to the mass-media, by issuing official publications, and by creating the conditions for free and undisturbed notification about activities from their sphere of activities All ministries, according to their official duty, send information to the Ministry of Information, which then informs the public by presenting the information at a press conference.
In addition, on the first Monday of every month, the Ministry of Environmental Protection holds press conferences at which the public can get information about all current activities and problems and about working plans. The ministry also uses the press conferences to announce new bills. The ministry also publishes books and booklets, it organizes or participates in seminars and ministry officials give interviews.
To handle emergencies, the Civilian Protection Quarters, the bodies of the local self government and the Ministry of Information work together to manage a special center for alarming and mobilization. A coordinated body for accidents of great proportions involving chemical substances was formed within the government. Federal and Serbian Laws on Information (Articles 14 and 29) prescribe that the mass media, upon request by a public authority, must proclaim without any delay and in the full form the announcement of an emergency situation which can endanger human life and health. An organization responsible for measuring pollution and an official in charge of the installations are obliged by the Law on Environmental Protection to inform inspectors or any other authorized body when air pollution or radiation levels rise above normal.
Methods of Dissemination
In compliance with the Law on Environ-mental Protection (Article 12) the government submits annual reports on environmental conditions to parliament. The Environment Ministry also releases annual emissions data. Municipalities and towns are obliged to inform the public about the quality of air using the mass media or any other means of informing the public. Special bulletins containing all data on water and air pollution, noise, and the quality of drinking water are published in some towns, for example Novi Sad. However, public authorities have not informed the public about the possibilities of submitting information to international bodies concerning noncompliance with international rules.
According to the Law on Environmental Protection (Articles 6, 86 and 102), every enterprise is obliged to keep, in the prescribed way, records about the quantity and types of dangerous and waste substances that are used in the production and that are released into water, air and soil. Each enterprise is also obliged to give the information to the authorized bodies. If an enterprise intends to take any actions that could lead to an accident, it must inform the public about the possible consequences and the measures that should be taken for prevention and the removal of the harmful consequences "within the prescribed time limit." The law does not specify the length of this time limit, nor does the EIA Act from 1992; however, the Federal Law on Production and Trade of Toxic Material sets this time limit at eight days. If an enterprise or any other legal entity does not fulfill legal obligations in keeping the data and informing authorized bodies, they will be fined for an economic violation. The penalty for this kind of economic violation is at least dinars 1,500 (DEM 4,500), but the penalties are rarely imposed.
According to the Federal Law on Production and Trade of Toxic Material (1995), producers and importers of toxins are obliged to keep certain data and information, to inform the authorized federal body about them, and to record the trade and buyers of the toxins. Authorized federal bodies keep a register of the toxins, and the register can be accessed by all interested persons, including foreign bodies and organizations, in accordance with international treaties. The compilation of a register of polluters is just beginning.
Special attention is drawn to informing consumers. A consumer must be informed about the influence of products and services on both the environment and on health and about possible protective measures. This information can be a notice packed with the product or on the packaging, a statement in the mass media or another convenient way. Violation of this article of the law is treated as an economic violation. Two federal laws - on the protection of consumers and on sanitary requirements for foodstuffs - are in preparation. Consumer protection groups operate on the republic and provincial levels, as well as in some towns. Ecological NGOs in the cities of Belgrade, Nis, Subotica, Zrenjanin and Ledinci also concern themselves with consumer protection. Before economic sanctions, the NGO Vrelo ("Well") from Novi Sad organized public debates about the quality of some products. The agency CISIM from Belgrade authorizes the placement of a green apple on products as a sign of quality control. Similarly, the NGO Terra from Subotica places a symbol on "organic" food to verify there has not been subject to commercial manipulation. However, the NGO must employ a foreign agency for export because there are no unique laws, signs or inspectorates in Yugoslavia.
Electronic Means of Dissemination
The authorized bodies are obliged by the Law on the Information System in Serbia of 1996 to keep electronic records as prescribed by the law. The Program of the Unique System of Environmental Protection in Serbia of 1995 also prescribes the use of electronic data processing. However, the informational system in practice is not yet developed enough, and no information is available on websites.
The Federal Ministry of Science, Develop-ment and Environment stresses the existence of an official in charge of relations with NGOs. The ministry supports the U.N. initiative concerning cooperation with the NGOs, but officials may invite only a limited number of NGOs to the sessions and consultations. The ministry also expects more initiative and better information from NGOs. Unfortunately, the cooperation is not yet institutionalized and legalized. It appears there is mutual good will toward improving the cooperation, toward including the media, and toward raising the cooperation at the partnership level. The few serious steps have already been taken to improve the cooperation between environmental NGOs, including an NGO directory and the Yu eco network.
Nongovernmental Centers
An initiative has been started to found a nongovernmental informational center, but none exists at present.
According to Article 1 of the Federal Constitution, Serbia is "a democratic state of all citizens who live in it, founded on the freedoms and rights of men and citizens, and on the rule of law and social justice."
Section 2 of both constitutions guarantees human rights and freedoms of which those concerning public participation are the most important: the freedom of conviction, conscience, thought and of public expression of one's opinion; the freedom of the press and other means of public information; the freedom of speech, public declaration, peaceful assembly and participation in meetings; and the freedom of association for political, union and other purposes. According to Article 44 of the Federal Constitution, Article 48 of the Serbian Constitution and Articles 5 and 61 of the Law on Public Administration, the activities of all public authorities and officials can be criticized in public and can be controlled by citizens who have the right to make requests, petitions and suggestions according to which they can act, and get response if they ask for it, and the citizens cannot be called to account for doing so.
Unfortunately, those broad constitutional possibilities are not used in the Serbian Law on Environmental Protection of 1991 nor in the Environmental Impact Assessment Act of 1992. Those acts do not include any regulations concerning public participation. This omission is a contrast to the precedent period of Yugoslav self-management. Articles from some recent international agreements, such as Article 6 of United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which was ratified and passed as a law on June 26, 1997, in Federal Parliament, do point to the public participation in internal environmental legislation, but overall it seems it was forgotten that a strong democracy depends upon the right and ability of the people to get involved.
Article 8 of the Federal Constitution allows for the possibility to hold a referendum, but such possibility is not regulated by the federal law.
The Law on Referendum and People's Initiative of 1994 governs the possibilities of holding referendums at republic, regional and township levels and was passed in accordance with Article 2 of the Serbian Constitution. According to Article 10 of this Law, a republic-wide referendum can be scheduled by parliament if at least 50 MPs vote in favor, or by the government, or at the request of 100,000 voters. The results of a referendum are binding.
There is no specially prescribed right to referendum on environmental and related issues.
A referendum has not been called for any issue, including environmental cases. However, some NGOs have begun collecting signatures to call for a referendum on adopting a world referendum of the Biopolitics International Organization to protect the planet for future generations. The referendum would be held in January 2000.
| BOX 1: Public Opinion About Environmental Solutions in Novi Sad |
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According to research on environmental awareness carried out at the beginning of 1990, 85.4 percent of a representative sample of citizens of the town of Novi Sad agreed that the public is the strongest weapon in the fight against the pollution of nature, and 63.2 percent agreed that there can be no ecology without democracy and no democracy without ecology. Furthermore, 85.8 percent of the citizens agreed that the experts who are close to environmental problems should inform the public about dangerous environmental pollution as soon as they detect it. As far as other social factors that can influence the solution of environmental issues to a high degree, surveyed residents indicated the following: scientists and experts 77.4%, mass media 75.4%, environmental groups and movements (i.e. NGOs) 72.3%, environmental parties 65.7%, citizen initiative 58.5%, judiciary 56.6%.
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Right to Initiative
There is no special right to initiate lawmaking or rulemaking on the environment or related issues. However, according to Article 95 of the federal constitution, a federal legal act can be proposed by a group of at least 30,000 eligible voters. So far neither such a proposal nor public initiative on a proposal for changing or passing the corresponding republic legislation was held.
According to the regulation of the municipal assembly of Novi Sad, a group of at least 500 citizens may call for a meeting of the Municipal Assembly and the group may even propose decisions. This has not really been used in practice. The experiences of ecological movements from Novi Sad and Pancevo testify that ideas for the environment and related issues are more easily pushed through the assembly by a supportive deputy, although this often requires some political motivation. In this case, the ecological movement and its deputy have proposed and the Assembly has adopted a declaration on the intent to become an ecological town. Similar initiatives to proclaim an ecological municipality have been started by NGOs in Sombor, Subotica and Strbce. The Center for Socio-ecological Investigations and Documentation from Belgrade also is working on a project to support local ecological initiatives.
The representatives of the Federal Ministry of Environment regularly invite a limited number of NGOs to working group meetings in a consultative function. The limited number may signify groups which are privileged, but the selection is usually ad hoc and personal and not institutionalized practice. In many cases it appears the ministry prefers to invite independent experts instead of NGO representatives.
When invited to the meetings, NGOs do not have any right to vote or to veto.
In practice, the experts and NGOs who are invited to participate in a ministry session are able to have their comments seriously taken into account. This ability applies only to the invited experts and NGOs, and there is no set procedure for defining or deciding on who will be consulted. Only some of the competent experts and NGOs are invited, and as a result, there is some privilege in having comments taken into account. This form of public participation occurs in practice relatively often and appears to be effective when allowed.
The former practice of broadcasting of parliament sessions live on television has been stopped. Ministry of Environment officials in Serbia say even they do not have enough information because the monitoring and the Serbian environmental informational system is not yet fully in place. The proposal of measures for improving contact with the public was made at the beginning of 1992, but the development of this system has been slowed greatly under the present conditions.
There are no groups that are regularly consulted formally or informally on law and policymaking. However, some NGOs propose legal acts, participate in the changing of the laws, insist on the implementation of environmental legislation, while others write petitions to parliament or organize meetings of protest.
Openness of Parliament
According to Article 85 of the Regulations of the Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, the president can invite some individuals to participate in parliamentary sessions. Article 76 states that experts and scientists may be invited to take part in the work of the assembly working bodies. Articles 169-173 describe conditions for the presence of media representatives. Scientists and experts have right to speak and journalists only to observe.
| BOX 2: Ecological NGOs |
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The role of the NGOs is central to the development of civil society and participatory democracy, particularly in transitional societies. Of the 558 Yugoslav NGOs that are registered in the 1997 Directory of NGOs, (about 200 NGOs did not provide information about themselves) about 70 percent are "mini" NGOs. It is interesting that the most numerous among them are ecological organizations - 114 or 20.4 percent. In addition, 2.9 percent are established to protect ambient sites and another 2.9 percent are educational and investigation groups that are partial ecological, bringing the total number of ecological NGOs to 146, or 26.2 percent of all NGOs. In Montenegro, ecological NGOs made up 48.7 percent of the total NGOs, down from 75 percent in 1993-1994. The first meeting of Yugoslav ecological NGOs was held in 1994 in Igalo, but up to now they have remained unrelated, much more of grassroots than mainstream type. According to data about goals, projects and activities printed in the NGO directory, Yugoslav ecological NGOs are more educational (54.5%) or informative and editorial (42.5%) than they are occupied in public participation (28,1%) and in investigations (26.7%).
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Ecological funding is available on all levels, some of which goes to NGOs, but there is no funding specifically dedicated to public participation projects and public participation training.
Articles 52 and 77 of the federal constitution provide a right to environmental information and its court protection. The republic constitution does not explicitly establish this right, but the right and its court protection are established in Articles 9 and 112 of the Serbian Law on Environmental Protection.
Public access to the activities of the public authorities is guaranteed by both the Federal and Serbian constitutions (Articles 122 and 10), but neither document guarantees court protection in this case.
In environmental cases, Article 77 of the federal constitution explicitly establishes constitutional court and other court protection with regard to the following issues: environmental protection; air and water regimes of federal and international importance; international aspects of coastal seas and navigable ways; infectious diseases and plant pests on a federal level; remedies; animal and plant protection means; control of transport of animals and plants when crossing the frontier; genetic material in agriculture and forestry; radiation; and production, trade and transport of weapons, toxic, inflammable, explosive, radioactive, and other dangerous material.
Both the federal and republic constitutions and other legislation provide a broad basis to protect environmental and public participation rights by providing access to justice. Unfortunately, there are big differences between constitutionally proclaimed and legally inaugurated on the one side, and the legally protected and especially penalty protected on the other side.
There are three kinds of infractions of the law in environmental cases: infringements, economic violations and criminal acts. Between 1981 and 1988, there were 12,161 reported environmental criminal acts in Serbia, or 23.3 percent of the total 52,266 criminal acts. In the field of environmental protection, charges were filed in 9,249 cases, of which 4,766 resulted in convictions. Compared with other criminal acts, 17 percent more cases had charges filed, but 15 percent fewer cases ended in a conviction. This high rate of charges and low rate of convictions is likely the result of encouraging ecological initiatives combined with discouraging "lack of evidence."
At the end of December 1997 the public prosecutor in Pancevo brought a criminal charge against eight responsible people because of an accident in a nitrogen plant that killed one man and injured several others. This case is sad but also encouraging because in similar cases before, only workers were held responsible.
Of the 3,217 perpetrators of economic violations in 1995, 290 (9 percent) were responsible persons convicted for sanitary incorrectness of foodstuffs. A similar percentage of legal entities charged with economic violations were convicted for problems with foodstuffs (280 of the 2,936, or 9.8 percent). Judges from the Novi Sad Commercial Court estimate that convictions for the pollution of environment (i.e. soil, water, air, etc.) make up two to three percent of all convictions for economic violations. One judge heard only one such environmental case for two years; another judge heard two such cases.
Public authorities are bound to make a decision as soon as possible, within a month or two months, depending on the whether it is necessary to carry out hearings and investigations (Federal Law on General Administrative Procedure of 1997, Article 203). If the authorities do not make a decision within the prescribed term, the party has a right to appeal in the same manner as if the request had been rejected. The term for appeal is 15 days from the day of the delivery of the decision (Article 220). The term for deciding on the appeal is two months (Article 237). The Serbian Law on Environment Protection (Article 101) states that corresponding ministry decides on the appeal of first-level authorized municipal authority and the government decides on the first-level decision of the ministry. The term to bring charges in case of a judicial appeal of administrative decisionmaking procedure is 30 days and this initiated appeal does not prevent the performance of administrative enactment.
| TABLE 1: Administrative Standing | ||
|---|---|---|
| In the administrative decisionmaking process | In the administrative appeal of administrative decisionmaking process | |
Individuals |
||
| every person | - | - |
| interested/affected | x | x |
NGOs |
||
| everyone | - | - |
| interested/affected | x | x |
When fighting decisions of governmental bodies, an individual or NGO may initiate an administrative procedure or administrative contest or may contest the constitutionality of the action in the constitutional court. The arbitrage must be contracted. In this case the individual or NGO may apply to an arbitration court according to applicable procedure. There is also a right to go to special economic courts according to civil procedure.
While actio popularis protects collective rights only in a constitutional complaint or action, it is especially dedicated to protecting individual human rights and freedoms. It has subsidiary character and the federal constitutional court decides about it when all other legal protection is exhausted. An NGO whose main focus is the protection of human rights also has a right to initiate constitutional action. It is interesting that the right to a constitutional complaint exists in the federal constitution and in some ratified international conventions but does not exist in the Serbian Constitution. The practice of the federal constitutional court is poor and mainly negative because of the lack of main condition. Out of all 80 recent constitutional complaints, two dealt with ecological issues.
| TABLE 2: Legal Standing Against Government | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Special administrative court | Civil court | Criminal court | Arbitration court or special economic courts | Constitutional court | |
Individuals |
|||||
| every person | x | x | - | - | - |
| interested/affected | - | - | x | - | x |
NGOs |
|||||
| everyone | - | x | - | - | - |
| interested/affected | - | - | x | - | x |
In spite of some procedural difficulties, the number of ecological actions is increasing, but there was not the expected flood of them. The action in public interest does not permit addressing international bodies.
The right to initiate criminal procedure belongs to the public prosecutor, the affected person and the legal advocate. Both federal and republic penal legislation contains many of provisions concerning environmental protection, including some criminal acts against the economy, health of people, general security, freedom, life and body and so on. The criminal also include pollution of environment (the Criminal Law of the Republic of Serbia, Article 133) and the denial of environmental information (the republic Law on Environment Protection, Article 109).
It was suggested and publicly supported that a new federal criminal Law should include the right to environmental information and that denial of this information should be an criminal act. Legal experts estimate that the environmental penal legislation does not implement such penalties and that it is not worked out from the standpoint of international conventions.
| TABLE 3: Legal Standing Against Polluters | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Special administrative court | Civil court | Criminal court | Arbitration court or special economic courts | Constitutional court | |
Individuals |
|||||
| every person | - | x | - | - | - |
| interested/affected | - | - | x | - | - |
NGOs |
|||||
| everyone | - | x | - | - | - |
| interested/affected | - | - | x | - | - |
In the field of legal project activities, there are three NGOs in Belgrade - the Law Projects Center, the Association for Protecting the Urban Heritage and Ambiance of Belgrade, and the Society for Clean Air in Serbia - and one NGO in Backa Palanka, the Society for Nature Protection.
Three other NGOs involved in legal aid and eco-legal protection in Belgrade are: the Association for Protecting the Municipality of Cukarica; the Committee for Protecting Zvezdara; and the Society for Protecting the Original Ambiance of Senjak, Dedinje and Topcidersko brdo and the Rights of Their Citizens. Two more legal NGOs operate in Novi Sad: the Ecological Movement of Vojvodina and the Ecological Movement of Novi Sad. In 1996 alone the Ecological Movement of Novi Sad was legally engaged in 70 environmental cases.
