At its meeting held today, the Committee on European Integration considered and unanimously supported the Fourth semi-annual report on the overall activities within Montenegro’s integration process to the EU for the period July - December 2015, and the Eighth Quarterly Report on the overall activities within Montenegro’s integration process to the EU for the period October - December 2015.

The said reports were presented by the Chief Negotiator Ambassador Mr Aleksandar Andrija Pejović and on that occasion he informed the attending members on the activities contributing to dynamics of negotiation process and in the end have the goal to open new negotiation chapters and close those opened so far. In addition, speaking of progress of negotiations in certain chapters, the Ambassador Pejović pointed out that in December 2015 Montenegro had opened two new chapters, 14 - Transport policy and 15 – Energy, and that, with regard to closing benchmarks, it had progressed the most in chapters 07 - Intellectual property law, 10 - Information society and media, and 30 - External relations.

The Committee members were also informed on the Fourth Quarterly Report on implementation of obligations from Montenegro’s Programme of Accession to the European Union for the period 2015 - 2018; then Montenegro’s Programme of Accession to the European Union for the period 2016 - 2018; Report on implementation of 2015 Action Plan for implementation of the 2014-2018 Strategy for informing the public on the EU accession process, and finally, 2016 Action Plan for implementation of the 2014-2018 Strategy for informing the public on the EU accession process.

Speaking of obligations from Montenegro’s Programme of Accession to the European Union, the Chair of the meeting and Deputy Chairperson of the Committee Ms Marija Maja Ćatović expressed pleasure over the one hundred percent of implementation of obligations by a significant number of institutions and also within a large number of chapters. With regard to success of implementation of obligations in the fourth quarter of 2015, 65% out of 95 planned laws and secondary legislation was implemented. Implementation of 137 laws was planned for the period 2016-2018.

Finally, during the discussion on action plans relating to the Strategy for informing the public on the EU accession process, they talked about the planned activities with regard to promotion and education of citizens, including this year’s marking of Europe Day.