Serbia Lifts Ban on Late Night Sale of Alcohol

Serbia’s Constitutional Court has ruled that a ban on the sale of alcohol after 10pm in Belgrade is unconstitutional.After a year and a half, Belgraders will again be able to buy alcohol after 10 pm after the court deemed the ban unconstitutional.

The city authorities in the Serbian capital introduced the measure in the spring of 2011.

Under the ban, kiosks, petrol stations and any 24-hour shops were obliged to put warnings in visible places and the penalty for selling alcohol after the prescribed hours was 20,000 dinars (about 180 euro).

The explanation at the time was that the ban would have made it impossible to buy alcohol “for everyone, not just for minors”.

The town of Novi Sad tried to introduce the ban on the sale of alcohol after 11 pm, but the Constitutional Court ruled it unconstitutional one month before Belgrade reached for a similar solution.

In 2011, the city of Belgrade also decided that coffee shops located in apartment buildings must close by midnight during the weeknights, any by 1 am during weekends.

That ban, however, is still in place.