Serbia, EU Ink Trade Liberalization Agreement

Mladjan Dinkic, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Regional Development of Serbia. File photo

Serbia and the EU signed a bilateral trade liberalization agreement on Tuesday.

The agreement was signed by Mladjan Dinkic, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Regional Development of Serbia, and the European Commissioner for Trade Karel De Gucht. It is considered an important step on Serbia's way towards its WTO accession, which is one of the prerequisites for a EU membership."

"Today's signature is a milestone in Serbia's WTO accession process and an important step towards fostering our economic relations," Karel De Gucht commented. "Serbia has made remarkable progress in preparing for WTO entry and the EU remains a strong supporter of its swift WTO accession."

"Today's event represents a step closer to our final goal and we are confident that it will help in finishing the rest of the bilateral negotiations in the WTO in the months to come. If we find the same constructive attitude with other partners, we are ready to finish accession negotiations by the end of this year," Mladjan Dinkic has stated.

Serbia applied for WTO membership in December 2004. In February 2005, the WTO General Council accepted its application, and a working group was established to start the negotiations. Parallel negotiations are being led at working party level and bilaterally with a number of WTO members.

The EU is Serbia's main trading partner.

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