BEKOP PROGRAM
2021
BEKOP CONFERENCE
For five years now, Belgrade Law Conference has been bringing together eminent lecturers, panelists, young lawyers and law students to discuss many current, useful and interesting topics, all with the aim of contributing to educating future experts and providing them with practical work in many legal areas that we cover.
Some of these areas are advocacy, judiciary, prosecution, notary public, enforcement, mediation, arbitration, business lawyers and many others.
We are incredibly proud of the cooperation we have achieved with offices, chambers, institutions, which you can see on the list of our partners, but also with eminent experts without whom these conferences would not be what they are today.
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY LAW
Intellectual property law in Serbia is still developing, and it represents the backbone of the fourth industrial revolution, the digital revolution.
Intellectual property law is divided into two categories, industrial property which includes patents, trademarks, industrial design and geographical indications and copyright which includes literary works, film, music and works of art and related rights such as performers rights to their performances, phonogram producers’ rights and the rights of broadcasting organizations to their radio and TV programs.
The Belgrade Law Conference, in cooperation with the Intellectual Property Office, organizes a conference for which more participants apply each year than we have seats. For that reason, we decided to dedicate a significant part of the program to intellectual property law.
MEDIATION
Mediation is an alternative way of resolving disputes, in which a third independent, neutral and impartial person, a mediator, helps the parties to the conflict to reach a mutually acceptable solution. Mediation can be accessed before and during court proceedings, as well as during legal proceedings or during enforcement proceedings.
The specificity of mediation is that it is a voluntary, informal, extremely fast and cheaper procedure is that during the procedure where parties retain full control and no one can make a decision on how to resolve their disputed relationship, and if an agreement is reached, they conclude it in the common interest. The role of the mediator is reflected in the fact that he helps the parties to determine their interests in relation to the other party and reach an agreement. The agreement may have the force of an executive document, and the mediator and proxies of the parties may participate in its written drafting. Compared to the regular costs of court proceedings, depending on the value of the dispute, it is 35 to 60% cheaper.
TRIAL SIMULATIONS
The Belgrade Law Conference was established precisely to bring the practice and work in the judicial system closer to its participants.
We believe that there is no better way to achieve this goal than workshops and trial simulations.
Under the auspices of the Belgrade Bar Association and its president, Mr. Jugoslav Tintor, in 2018, Belgrade Law Conference started organizing trial simulations. As part of the simulation, the registered candidates decide whether they are interested in working as judges, as defense, prosecutors, witnesses or want to be an audience. After the roles are assigned to the participants, the case is presented and they go to the preparation of eminent experts, lawyers such as Maja Atanaskovic, member of the Board of the Belgrade Bar Association, lawyer Natasa Jovicic, Deputy Public Prosecutor of the Higher Public Prosecutor’s Office, Ms. Jasmina Paunović and many other professional lawyers.
HUMAN RIGHTS
Modern society is based on respect for human rights.
The term human rights refers to a concept based on the idea that human beings have universal natural rights, or status, independent of legal jurisdiction or other determining factors such as origin, race, citizenship, and gender. As can be seen from the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, human rights (at least in the period after the Second World War) are based on innate human dignity and retain their universal and inalienable character.
It is our obligation to stand up for human rights and to defend them at every step.
ECOLOGICAL LAW
We must be aware that our future depends on our behavior in the present. Environmental disasters pose the greatest risk to human health. Environmental hazards are especially considered as risk factors. The cause of all risks is precisely human actions.
General economic development, urbanization, irrational use of natural resources, disposal of all types of waste, as well as mass and uncontrolled use of chemical agents in agriculture have led to a very unsatisfactory state of the environment. Our daily activities lead to a deterioration of the environment. For these reasons, legal protection of the environment is very important.
Through it, it reaches individuals and influences their behavior by imposing sanctions for certain behaviors.
IUSTITIA
The Belgrade Law Conference considers that the written word is of exceptional importance for the society, and even more for legal professionals and law students.
To that end, the beginning of 2021 was marked by the opening of the BEKOP IUSTITIA portal. This portal will be a place where members of the organization, eminent lawyers, but also students and young legal professionals will be able to publish their texts and analyzes or express their opinions on important topics.
BEKOP IUSTITIA will be lead by the sector of the organization which consists of young people with strong attitudes and the desire to make our society, a better place for everyone.
CONTENT FOR MEMBERS
The Belgrade Law Conference believes that the basic and most important resource, are not the contacts it has made during its existence or cooperation with all institutions or offices, but the people who make it up.
With this in mind, we strive to give our members every possible chance to improve their knowledge and their capabilities.
In addition to having an “behind the scenes” approach to the functioning of the organization, opportunities to realize their idea and the chance to meet all the lecturers also have the opportunity to attend lectures intended exclusively for members of the organization.
PROGRAM EVALUATION TO DATE
The evaluation of the project was done through a survey at the end of each event as well as via SMS messages since 2016 and so far it has included over 500 participants in the BEKOP program. The results of the surveys, which we are very proud of, show that the answer to the question whether this conference helped you understand the presented areas, the answer of 100% of the respondents was yes. The results of the survey show that 53% of the participants in the BEKOP program are still studying at law faculties throughout Serbia, while 47% of the participants are law graduates.
A more detailed review of the numbers shows that 41% of the students were in the final fourth year of study, while 7% were in the first year, 20% in the second year, 26% in the third year while the rest were graduates.
A worrying result we have come to is that, of all the participants, less than third of the participants is engaged in some way (volunteering, internship, internship or job). Of these participants, 35% are employed on a permanent basis while 65% are mainly engaged in volunteer work in organizations or work as trainees in law firms and courts.
The following graphs show the answers to the questions – which of the presented professions seem the most attractive to you and why:
