EU weighs freezing 1.5 billion euros in Serbia funds

The European Commission is weighing whether to suspend about €1.5 billion in EU funding for Serbia over rule-of-law concerns, as scrutiny of Belgrade’s judicial reforms intensifies. Euronews reports that enlargement commissioner Marta Kos told MEPs the Commission is awaiting an assessment from the Council of Europe’s Venice Commission on laws adopted in January.

Kos’s critique, as quoted by Euronews, focuses on how the amendments reshape Serbia’s anti-corruption prosecution and judiciary. She said the changes create a “flawed form of autonomy” for anti-corruption prosecutors while weakening judicial independence, and pointed to crackdowns on protesters and “recurrent meddling in independent media”. The threat of suspending funds is meant to be leverage: Serbia is a candidate country (since 2012) and EU money is a key tool Brussels uses to steer domestic reforms.

But the same tool also reveals the EU’s institutional habit of governing by conditional cash transfers. The Commission can slow accession talks, but freezing funds is more immediate because it hits budgets and projects. That makes it politically legible inside Serbia: Brussels becomes a visible actor in domestic power struggles, and Serbian leaders can frame compliance as external coercion rather than internal legitimacy.

Euronews links the current standoff to Serbia’s geopolitical hedging. While Serbia has condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, it has refused to impose sanctions on Moscow, and the European Parliament has repeatedly criticised Belgrade’s lack of alignment with EU foreign policy. The Commission’s rule-of-law complaints therefore sit alongside an unspoken test of strategic loyalty.

The protests mentioned by Kos began after a concrete awning collapsed at a train station in Novi Sad in December 2024, killing 16 people, Euronews writes, and evolved into broader anti-government and anti-corruption demonstrations. That origin story matters: when public anger is anchored in a specific failure of infrastructure and accountability, judicial “reform” quickly looks like insulation from consequences.

The Venice Commission’s “urgent opinion” is expected in the coming weeks, according to Euronews. Until then, the €1.5 billion remains a bargaining chip that can be pulled at any moment.