Dušan Vujović

Serbian Finance Minister Dusan Vujovic and South Korean Ambassador Lee Do-Hoon on Friday signed an agreement on avoidance of double taxation of income,

The agreement is aimed at encouraging more efficient business cooperation.

Next year's budget deficit will definitely be lower than the RSD 120 billion proposed in the budget bill, Finance Minister Dusan Vujovic said Wednesday.

Next year's budget deficit will definitely be lower than the RSD 120 billion proposed in the budget bill, Finance Minister Dusan Vujovic said Wednesday.

Dusan Vujovic stated on Friday that he expects that the government would find room for increase of salaries and pensions during the talks with the IMF.

The negotiations will officially open on Monday and I expect that room for increase of salaries and pensions would be found in the scope we originally had in mind, the finance minister told the Belgrade-based Television Pink.

IMPORTANT MEETING Putin and Vucic in Moscow

Addressing reporters ahead of his meeting with a Serbian delegation in Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin talked the most about economic topics.

He stressed that he was aware that the global economy is in bad shape, but that regardless, economic cooperation with Serbia was good.

Dusan Vujovic says the government has launched the public enterprise reform, but did not expect "people will try to stop the process in every way."

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) does not expect the Serbian government to proceed with the sale of the national telecoms operator.

Serbian Minister of Finance Dusan Vujovic and World Bank (WB) Regional Director Ellen Goldstein have signed in Lima an agreement on a EUR 89.5 million loan.

The Serbian government the IMF "agreed on Friday to hold talks on a potential increase of public sector salaries and pensions," Dusan Vujovic said.

The IMF Mission "underlined that Serbia is surpassing its macroeconomic and macro-monetary targets in every sense," the finance minister told reporters after a meeting with the IMF Mission at the National Bank of Serbia.

Nikolic's office said on Thursday that he refused to sign the law and sent it back to parliament because he believes it doesn't comply with the constitution as it says that only sitting tenants can buy state-owned real estate.

The constitution says however that "all citizens have an equal position on the market", Nikolic's office noted.

A planned salaries and pensions hike will not be symbolic, but will also not jeopardize the path of reforms, says Minister of Finance Dusan Vujovic.

Vujovic told B92 on Thursday that Serbia is now, thanks to savings, in a position to "bring back" salaries and pensions, and not only to the previous level, "but to a much higher level in the coming years."