In the Official Gazette of RS no. 92/2023, dated October 27, 2023, amendments and supplements to the Law on Health Insurance were published, becoming effective on November 4, 2023 (“the Law“).

The Law on Amendments to the Law on Tobacco (“the Law”) was published in the Official Gazette of the RS no. 92/2023 of October 27, 2023. The subject amendments entered into force on the eighth day upon the day of publishing i.e., on November 4, 2023, with several exceptions.

On August 25, 2023, the Government of the Republic of Serbia adopted the Personal Data Protection Strategy for the period 2023-2030 (“Strategy”).

As we have written about in one of our previous texts, the Labour Law (“the Law“) stipulates, among other, that an employee’s employment may be terminated if there is a justified reason pertaining to employer’s needs, i.e., if due to technological, economic or organisational changes the need for certain job ceases or if the workload is reduced.

In one of our previous texts (available here) we discussed misdemeanors, hence in order to analyze in more detail legislator’s penalty policy pertaining to legal entities we will here elaborate the economic offences which, along with criminal acts and misdemeanors, also fall into the penalty corpus of our legal system.

According to the definition contained in the Law on Misdemeanors (Official Gazette of RS no. 65/2013, 13/2016, 98/2016 – decision of CC, 91/2019, 91/2019 – other law and 112/2022 – decision of CC) (“the Law“), misdemeanor is an unlawful act established as misdemeanor by law or other regulation of a competent authority and which is subject to misdemeanor sanctions.

With yet another election cycle impacting legislative activity in Serbia, few – but noteworthy – updates warrant attention, according to PR Legal Managing Partner Ivana Ruzicic. Notably, land conversion fees have been eliminated, potentially unlocking vast construction opportunities, while the excise tax framework is being modernized, with a centralized electronic system set to streamline processes.

The Law on Amendments to the Law on Excise (“the Law”) was published in the Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia no. 75/2023 of September 6, 2023, and it entered into force on the eighth day after its publishing, i.e., on September 14, 2023, while it shall be applied from October 1, 2023.

On August 25, 2023, the Government of the Republic of Serbia adopted the Personal Data Protection Strategy for the period 2023-2030 (“Strategy”).

Meeting of minds of the contracting parties undeniably represents the very foundation of the contract law, hence both theory and practice agree that there is no agreement without it. However, when it comes to the manner of expressing such will, the situation is somewhat different.

Amendments and supplements to the Law on Planning and Construction (“Law”) were published in the Official Gazette no. 62/2023 from 27 July 2023 and entered into force on 4 August 2023, whereas certain provisions of the Law will enter into force in 2024 and 2026, respectively.

Amendments to the Law on Foreigners (Official Gazette of RS no. 24/2018, 31/2019 and 62/2023) and the Law on Employment of Foreigners (Official Gazette of RS no. 128/2014, 113/2017, 50/2018, 31/2019 and 62/2023) (“the Laws”) were published in the Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia no. 62/2023 of July 27, 2023, and entered into force on August 4, 2023.

At the beginning of June 2023, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled in favor of the famous Jack Daniel’s distillery in a trademark infringement lawsuit after a squeaky toy for dogs appeared on the market, which resembles a bottle of the famous whiskey Jack Daniel’s Old No. 7 Black Label Tennessee Whiskey in the context of shape of the bottle and other elements (trade dress).

On July 10, 2023, the European Commission adopted a new mechanism for personal data transfer between the EU and the US – the Decision no. C (2023) 4745 (“the Decision”), which stipulates that the US provide adequate and appropriate level of protection, i.e., that corresponds to the one existing in the EU in terms of personal data transferred from the EU to the US companies, without the obligation to undertake any further protective measures. The Decision entered into force and started to apply on the day of its adoption.

In one of our previous texts (available here) we wrote about the connection between the protection of competition and protection of personal data, namely whether competition authorities may consider infringements of personal data in their investigations.

The new General Product Safety Regulation of the EU, which has recently entered into force, was published in the Official Journal of the EU on May 23, 2023, and it shall start to apply on December 13, 2024 (“the Regulation”).

In one of our previous texts we wrote about the recent decision of the Spanish personal data protection authority, by which it fined an employer as the controller of personal data for using the option of audio recording within the employees surveillance system, which data were subsequently used for termination of an employment contract.

The Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Serbia has recently issued the opinion no. 011-00-313/2022-04 (“the Opinion”), which refers to taxation of the fees paid by resident legal entities to non-residents for leasing servers abroad.