Sarajevo, 2 July 2018

The final conference of the project „Consolidation and Further Development of the Judicial Communication and Information System” funded by the European Union with the aim of strengthening the judiciary in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) was held today.

The project which developed a number of innovations aiming to provide faster, more effective and better quality services for citizens was implemented by the High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council of Bosnia and Herzegovina (HJPC). The first mobile application of the BiH judiciary – “E-SUD”, which enables the access to court cases via Android and iOS mobile devices, was presented at the conference. The new method of issuing criminal status certificates and the calculator of the foreseeable costs of the court proceedings were presented as well.

Director for the Western Balkans at the European Commission Directorate-General for Neighbourhood and Enlargement Negotiations Genoveva Ruiz Calavera confirmed the continued support of the EU to the HJPC and the judiciary of BiH in strengthening equal access to effective justice and providing a higher quality of services to the citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

“The questions that citizens in Bosnia and Herzegovina ask themselves are very simple and direct: Can we trust judges and prosecutors? Can we rely on them for our rights to be upheld against crime, especially organised crime and corruption? The day we can answer these very clear questions is the day we will be able to say we have succeeded in the reforms of the rule of law in Bosnia and Herzegovina,” said Director Ruiz Calavera.

President of the HJPC BiH Milan Tegeltija, expressed his sincere gratitude to the EU on behalf of the BiH judiciary for its lasting support, saying that: “The support of the EU to the BiH judiciary was and remains essential in achieving sustainable results towards guaranteeing the access to effective justice for citizens, providing citizens with new services and contemporary ways of getting information from courts. Everything we have been working on in the past years and what we continue doing – feeds into the most important objective – the judiciary providing timely and quality services to the citizens of BiH in line with the European standards.“

In the presentation of the key project achievements, Director of the HJPC BiH Secretariat Admir Suljagić said: „By means of this key project for BiH’s judiciary, we have simplified and accelerated the process of issuing the criminal status certificates in all municipal and basic courts, we have enabled informing of citizens on foreseeable costs of court proceedings and we have developed the mobile application for access to court cases. It is our intention to broaden the scope and availability of the easily accessible services of the BiH judiciary, by making them available to citizens in the most convenient ways, online and via mobile devices as well.“

The project ‘”Consolidation and Further Development of the Judicial Communication and Information System” was funded by the European Union in the amount of €1.8 million contributing to a more functional and effective judiciary in BiH. The next phase of EU assistance with about €6 million will start in August this year and will build up on previous projects’ results.