European Parliament Rapporteur for Serbia, MEP Vladimir Bilcik, refused to comment an N1 report that he proposed the removal of any mention of the state-controlled Telekom Serbia amendments submitted to his 2022 report.

An e-mail for Bilcik’s office said that the Rapporteur will not comment ongoing negotiations on the amendments to his report. “As the negotiations on the 2022 report on Serbia are ongoing, the Rapporteur will not be making any comments on negotiations which are taking place behind closed door as is a long-standing good practice in the European Parliament.

“Bilcik regrets any attempts seeking to disturb this process of negotiations through leaks and speculation. He will comment on the final text of the report only after negotiations and voting is concluded as throughout the current political negotiations only one principle applies: nothing is agreed until everything is agreed and the only text that matters is the final text of the report,” the e-mail said.

N1 reported earlier this week that Telekom Serbia wants any mention of its alleged wrongdoing removed from the report. An N1 source in the European Parliament said that Bilcik proposed removing Telekom from amendments to his report while the Nova.rs portal reported that Bilcik met with Telekom officials a day before a meeting on the amendments.