The United Arab Emirates and the Republic of Serbia have signed a new cooperation agreement focused on family preservation, child protection, and demographic policy, deepening bilateral ties in social development. The accord was signed by Sana bint Mohammed Suhail, UAE Minister of Family, and Jelena Zaric Kovacevic, Serbias Minister for Family Care and Demography, on the sidelines of the international expert conference One Heart More, held in Belgrade on 24 and 25 May 2026. Ahmed Almenhali, UAE Ambassador to Serbia, attended the signing alongside officials from both governments, according to the Emirates News Agency (WAM).
A Shared Framework for Family Welfare
The agreement establishes a structured channel for exchanging expertise, policy models, and best practices across family welfare, child protection, population planning, and demographic resilience. Both countries committed to organizing joint workshops, seminars, training programmes, and field visits aimed at consolidating institutional experiences and supporting family stability.Emirates 24|7 reported that the accord covers fertility-enhancing initiatives, work-life balance measures, early childhood development, and broader community participation in caring for children and the elderly.
Aligning with the UAE Year of the Family
The partnership lands during the UAEs 2026 Year of the Family, a national focus on unity, stability, and intergenerational cohesion.Gulf News notes that the campaign positions strong families as the foundation of national growth, with policy attention spanning parental support, child wellbeing, and elderly care. By formalizing cooperation with Serbia, the UAE extends that domestic agenda into an international knowledge-sharing partnership, drawing on Serbias own demographic and family-care reforms.
What the Two Sides Will Exchange
Under the cooperation framework, the two ministries will share research outputs on demographic trends, family resilience, and child protection systems. The agreement encourages exchanges of policy designs around parental leave, fertility support, and protective frameworks for children, alongside joint capacity-building for social workers and family-services professionals. Officials from both sides framed the deal as a long-term investment in building modern family-support infrastructure rather than a one-off declaration.
Diplomatic Context
The agreement adds a social-development pillar to a UAE-Serbia relationship that has expanded across trade, investment, and culture in recent years. It complements broader bilateral instruments and reflects a wider UAE pattern of pairing economic engagement with cooperation on social policy. With the documents signed in Belgrade and the implementation phase now beginning, both ministries are expected to define detailed work programmes for joint training, expert visits, and shared research projects in the coming months.
