Belgium
EU debating access lawPosted Oct 20 2007
A group of 14 specialists from the Council of Europe refused to make changes on a draft of the treaty on Access to Official Documents, which would open the right to request access to all documents held by the judicial and legislative branches of government.
In a 10-to-4 vote, the proposal would have brought the European Convention on Access to Official Documents in line with the prevailing standards in the 47 countries of the Council of Europe, according to the International freedom of Expression Exchange.
After the meeting, held in Strasbourg October 9-12, the specialists rejected further discussion on the topic.
The draft treaty will pass on to the Council of Europe's Steering Committee on Human Rights (CDDH) for further discussion Nov. 8.
Civil society groups, such as Access Info Europe, ARTICLE 19 and the Open Society Justice Initiative, are calling on the CDDH to reject the treaty as it stands, and to either pass the proposed improvements or have the specialists continue their discussion on the draft.
Helen Darbishire, Director of Access Info Europe, said “Rather than acting as independent specialists, a number of members of the Group have openly stated that they have instructions from their governments to ensure that the future Convention requires no changes to domestic law. The result is a draft treaty that accommodates the flaws and idiosyncratic features of the domestic legislation of countries represented in the Group, and hence falls below prevailing standards. This is a betrayal of the Group's mandate.”