Emne: Baltic Sea NGO Forum and Unesco supported ATI in Germany: What's next?
Fra: "walter.keim Gmail" <walter.keim@gmail.com>
Dato: 14/05/2013 07:05
Til: 'Foianet' <foianet@foiadvocates.info>

Dear all,

the Baltic Sea NGO Forum and UNESCO supported ATI (Access to Information) in Germany.

The good news is that the UN Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of the Human Rights Council (HRC) gives an opportunity to promote ATI:
There are 269 hits (Accessed January 2013) on "Access to Information" in the UPR-Info.org database e. g. freedom of information laws are mentioned for Canada, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Colombia, Cuba, Equatorial Guinea, France, Kenya, Tuvalu, Uzbekistan, and the REPUBLIC OF DJIBOUTI (submitted by ARTICLE 19). UNESCO has recommended Freedom of Information laws to all states reviewed during the 16. UPR session . Austria recommended to Bahrain (A/HRC/WG.6/13/L.4): "Enact a progressive, substantive Freedom of Information law". Djibouti and Ghana got same suggestion.
However UNESCO did not mention that ATI laws are missing in 5 federal states in Germany and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights ignored and censored the contributon of the Baltic Sea NGO Forum. 96 HRC states made approx. 200 suggestions. Every state had 74 seconds time to present recomendations. 6 of 8 suggestions of the Baltic Sea NGO Forum were supported. Some transparency aspects are covered, however ATI laws are not included directly.

What's next?
Meanwhile citizens in 5 German federal states are still denied the human right of ATI, found in more than 125 states with 5.9 billion people, i. e. 84 % of the worlds population.

Regards,
Netizen: http://walter.keim.googlepages.com
UN Universal Periodic Review (UPR):
http://wkeim.bplaced.net/files/foi-upr-de.htm#result
Will CoE Support the Human Right of Access to Information
in Germany? http://t.co/AavLgnOnz2
Is it possible to enforce access to information in Bavaria?
http://wkeim.bplaced.net/files/enforce_access_to_information.html


04/11/2012 14:51, walter.keim wrote:
Dear all,

two of the achievments of the Freedom of Information Advocates Network (FOIAnet) after 10 years are:
1) International Recognition as a Human Right
· RTI is now firmly recognised as an internationally guaranteed human right, with decisions at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and European Court of Human Rights, and global recognition by the UN Human Rights Committee
2) Rapid Increase in National Legal Recognition
· The number of national RTI laws has more than doubled since 2002, from 42 to 93 countries, comprising over three-quarters of the world’s population, with a concomitant growth in constitutional recognition for RTI

However Germany does not follow this trend:
  1. 84 states with approx. 5.5 billion inhabitants i. e. 78% of the world population give better access to information then the federal Freedom of Information Law in Germany (http://www.rti-rating.org/country-data/).  
  2. more than 115 states (http://right2info.org/laws) with more then 5.9 billion inhabitants i. e. 84 % of the worlds population adopted FOI laws or provisions in constitutions. 5 German states with half of the population lack FOI laws.
  3. The UN Convention against Corruption is ratified by 159 states with more then 6,5 billion inhabitants, but not by Germany
For 10 years I tried to make parliaments, politicians, the press, NGOs and courts aware of the human right of access to information. However only the Pirate Party took note of this.

Both GRECO (States against Corroption) and HRC (Human Rights Committee) did not promote the human right of access to information.

Is it time to demand that these experts do the jobb they are paid for?

Regards

--
Walter Keim
Netizen: http://walter.keim.googlepages.com
UN-Menschenrechtsausschuss: Deutsche Informationsfreiheits-
gesetze in der Kritik: http://t.co/vxdoGCuf
Is it possible to enforce access to information in Bavaria?
http://wkeim.bplaced.net/files/enforce_access_to_information.html


Emne: Who will support Germany?
Dato: Wed, 15 Feb 2012 07:51:32 +0100
Fra: Walter Keim <walter.keim@gmail.com>
Til: 'Foianet' <foianet@foiadvocates.info>

Germany has to improve the federal FOI law, adopt FOI laws in 5 local states (Bundesländer), ratify COE and UN conventions against corruption and improve transparency of funding of political parties to catch up with Europe, America, OSCE, OECD and BRIC states (see weakness no. 2, 3, 4, 8, 34, 35 and 52 of National Integrity Report Transparency Germany).

Who will support Germany?: http://wkeim.bplaced.net/foi-ngo.htm

--
Walter Keim
Netizen: http://sites.google.com/site/walterkeim/
Who will support transparency in Germany:
http://wkeim.bplaced.net/foi-ngo.htm
http://wkeim.bplaced.net/files/if-dimr-pbt-en.htm

Colours on picture: dark green: FOIA enacted. Yellow: pending law. FOIA= Freedom of Information Act

Informationsfreiheitgesetze in Europa