3 October 2025 – Guest blog by Vladimir Radomirović, from Pištaljka

In August 2023, Samantha Feinstein of the Government Accountability Project (GAP), a long-time friend and fellow whistleblowing activist, called to suggest we jointly develop proposals  to improve the protection of whistleblowers and reporting persons, as the UNCAC Conference of State Parties (CoSP) in Atlanta was approaching. The aim was to propose the Serbian government to table a draft resolution on this matter. 

At Pištaljka (The Whistle), we advocate for the cooperation of civil society organizations with the government. Over the past 15 years, we have had dozens of high-level government officials – including the president and the prime minister – speak at our events. In cooperation with the Judicial Academy, we regularly organize licensed training sessions for judges (there is even a Pištaljka poster in the Supreme Court building). We also train prosecutors, local officials and state agencies staff. Still, even with this strong network, Samantha’s idea to call for a resolution was a tall order. Would we be able to pull it off?

Despite cooperating with different levels of the government, it hasn’t made us immune to reprisals following articles on corruption and shady deals. We tend to get SLAPPed by senior government officials, resulting in days spent in court, whilst fighting off smear campaigns.

However, when I called the president to inquire about the state’s willingness to table a resolution based on civil society’s recommendations, he said yes. It was a great start, but then things got complicated…

As in any relationship, there has to be a lot of talking and explaining to reach an agreement, and a whole lot of listening. This was the case in our relations with the government. Once we got the green light from the president, we were going to speak with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) and the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) to get things moving. But all this got stalled due to an internal political crisis (not a rare thing in Serbia), and by the time we got into detailed discussions with the MFA and the MoJ, there was talk of another, very similar draft resolution being tabled by the State of Palestine. 

Some Serbian diplomats then got cold feet. How were they even going to table the resolution if there is going to be a competing one? How were they going to get support for Serbia’s one? What was Pištaljka’s role in this affair? A lot of questions amongst many unknowns. Not only that civil society’s engagement in the negotiations of UN resolutions is a difficult topic but it was the first time ever that Serbia would table a UN resolution. 

It took hours of phone calls and meetings with senior diplomats and MoJ officials to move past these obstacles. The MoJ, Serbia’s point of contact for the UNCAC, was extremely well-versed and operational but still had to work extra hard in helping us make the final push to get the Serbian mission in Vienna to eventually table the resolution.

Dragana Matović, an editor at Pištaljka, and I were not only invited as government experts to the informal negotiations – where the minister of justice headed the delegation at the very first session – but we also became part of the team of the country’s chief negotiators. In the end, we secured the resolution. And not only that: we managed to have it co-sponsored by countries that would otherwise avoid even speaking to one another. 

Throughout the negotiation process we had help from Louise Portas at the UNODC secretariat, and Yonatan Yakir of the UNCAC Coalition (thank you, Louise and Yonatan!). We also had Samantha Feinstein and Tom Devine, of the Government Accountability Project, in Atlanta to provide further advice on the spot.   

In the end, our greatest achievement has been the language of the Resolution on the Protection of Reporting Persons, especially the phrasing around good faith: Countries that use the term good faith in their legislation should not interpret it to question the motives of the whistleblower to report corruption.

This outcome was the result of trust between the state and Pištaljka, a relationship that took years to build. 

Resolution 10/8 is now a global standard for whistleblowing legislation, but we still have a long way to go if we are to provide a safe global environment for whistleblowers. One encouraging sign, for me, is that senior Serbian prosecutors discuss the resolution with their colleagues during Pištaljka’s training sessions on how to work with whistleblowers: “I was so proud to be in the Serbian delegation in Atlanta when this resolution was passed. This is a milestone achievement for Serbia”, said deputy chief prosecutor Miljko Radisavljević. 

It goes to show that, although corruption is still rampant in my country, there are ways to counter it. Including by instilling pride in government officials for directly and indirectly contributing to the UN resolution on the protection of whistleblowers.