No larger inflow of foreign investments in Serbia can be expected unless the problem of corruption and the practice that investors start businesses through mediators instead of official institutions is solved, Serbia's Anti-Corruption Council member Danilo Sukovic told Tanjug Thursday.

He said that the Council sent a letter to Serbian President Boris Tadic pointing to the problem and naming the investors that addressed the Council for help.

"We have evidence of the people who could not realize their requests legally and transparently through institutions, but were rather pressured into giving up on starting a business or were unable to buy a certain company," Sukovic stressed.

According to him, mediators often replace institutions and take commissions.

He stated the example of Brif company, whose representatives claim that they were offered conditions without the knowledge of the institutions, and the WAZ company, who was not able to buy a Serbian firm directly but only through a mediator.

Sukovic reiterated the earlier case of the French company Danone, which did not manage to purchase the Serbian company Knjaz Milos.

He pointed out that all projections on Serbia's development will remain a dead letter unless a more favorable atmosphere is created and the practice that a foreign investor negotiates with someone outside the system's institutions, like a tycoon or a political party, is eliminated.