The past decades continuous crisis in the judiciary system in Serbia, along with the adoption of new laws, and an increasing number of violations of human rights of citizens have put into sharp focus some new challenges before the CHRIS Network such as the need to better understand both national and international legislation in human rights area and the CHRIS Network internal values and vision, as well as its value proposition to the clients. Fully responsible in its mission to provide Free Legal Aid, the CHRIS Network gathered its lawyers, paralegals and support staff for the 22nd time to gain more knowledge, skills, and know how staying resolute to be ahead of the challenges.

Year after year, the CHRIS Network makes efforts to adopt more professional approaches and enhance its capacities faced with the complexity of the old and new legal ways in a country burdened with economic, political and financial crises. The Network's annual reports present not only an increase in number of human rights violations, but the violations tend to group in different areas every year and they, we may say, mirror the developments in the country. Such indicators push for continuous professional education as well as strengthening the Network's management and operational systems.

The 22nd educational seminar for the Network's permanent staff, paralegals, and lawyers held in Kovačica, July 9 /11, focused on the issue of filing a Constitutional Appeal as a pre-condition before appealing to the European Court for Human Rights in Strasbourg. The Constitution of the Republic of Serbia provides the Constitutional Court of Serbia with one of the central roles in the protection of human rights. The new law on the Constitutional Court envisages introduction of a new institute of constitutional appeal as an additional legal protection within the national legislation and ensures application of all rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution.

Certainly, it is an efficient legal remedy if efficiently used which would lower the number of individual appeals before the European Court. In reality, the situation in the field has not been improved. Most probably, the Constitutional Court has already become jammed with cases and prioritising of the appeals of the non-elected judges leaves other potential applications for Strasbourg in limbo. An expert view on the whole issue and its relevancy to the CHRIS Network work was given by Mr Marko Milanović, Belgrade Centre fro Human Rights.

The next steps in further professionalisation of the CHRIS Network legal team were discussed primarily in two directions, i.e. the legal team operational advancement and the strengths and threats in future work of the lawyers’ pool.

Then, the CHRIS Network dealt with some general and specific challenges:

• Making the Network’s achievements more visible,
• Strategy 2011 – 2014, and
• Public advocacy in suppory of the Law against Discrimination of Persons with Disabilities.

These issues were prepared and presented by Ivana Šaković, coordinator of the CHRIS Network legal team; Saša Aleksić , coordinator of the CHRIS Office Valjevo; Jelena Petrović, assistant to the CHRIS Network coordinator; and Dragan Đorđević – CHRIS Network coordinator.