BELGRADE, 25 February 2003 - A new centre for environmental issues, a joint endeavour of the OSCE Mission to Serbia and Montenegro and the Serbian Ministry for Natural Resources and Environment, will be opened Wednesday in Belgrade.
To mark the opening of the Centre for Cross-Sectional Co-operation and Inter-Agency Co-ordination, the Head of the OSCE Mission to Serbia and Montenegro, Ambassador Maurizio Massari, and the Serbian Minister for Natural Resources and Environment, Dr. Andjelka Mihajlov, will hold a press conference.
This new Centre will provide a co-ordination link between the Serbian government and international and local environmental organizations. It is also envisaged that it will act as a support structure, enabling full implementation of environmental legislation.
For its part, the OSCE Mission will provide the Centre with five environmental experts, as part of the Mission's environmental support programme for Serbia. The Centre will also produce a strategy for setting up an environmental information system for Serbia.
The OSCE Mission will use the occasion to outline Mission activities currently in progress and the Mission's activity plan for March 2003. Ambassador Massari will provide media representatives with background information related to the following Mission projects:
- Social and Economic action plan for southern Serbia
- Support for Domestic War Crimes Trials
- Plan of Action to assist the New Parliament of Serbia and Montenegro
- Focussed assistance to the Serbian government in order to implement the Organized Crime Law
- Media Reforms
