Serbia is in the process of adopting its first Law on Artificial Intelligence. As the first country in Southeast Europe to establish a comprehensive AI development framework, Serbia has positioned itself as a regional leader, a recognition further solidified through its presidency of the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI), a leading international organization focused on AI development, implementation and regulation.

The adoption of the Belgrade Ministerial Declaration on Artificial Intelligence in December 2024, supported by 44 EU and GPAI member states, marked a significant step forward in fostering an integrated partnership among the GPAI members by embracing AI technologies as drivers of economic and social progress, while reducing associated risks and ensuring benefits for people and the planet.

The adoption of the Law on Artificial Intelligence in Serbia could have very important implications for intellectual property protection and create further legal challenges. For instance, the emergence of generative AI systems has already raised the question whether AI-generated works can meet the requirements for copyright protection.

In the context of trademark law, AI has the potential to perform two contradictory functions:

• On the one hand, it can give rise to trademark infringement by generating content that violates pre-existing trade marks.
• On the other hand, it can serve as an effective tool for trade mark management and monitoring, which enables detecting and preventing infringement.

Artificial intelligence represents an advanced stage in the evolution of digital technology and poses significant challenges for patent law as well, particularly affecting the patenting of software and computer-implemented inventions.