News

Big Brother Awards Ceremony Held in Bulgaria
On January 28, 2008, Access to Information Programme and Internet Society Bulgaria presented the the Big Brother Awards at a special ceremony held in the Center of Culture and Debate The Red House. The jury recognized two Bulgarian institutions for their extensive violation of the right to privacy and the protection of personal data: the Ministry of Interior and the Council of Ministers of Bulgaria. Read more...

Bulgarian Court Repealed the Refusal of the Government to Provide Access to Contracts with Microsoft
In a decision, as of November 2, 2007, a panel of the Sofia City Court repealed the refusal of the Director of the Government Information Service (GIS) to provide access to information to the journalist from Capital weekly, Rosen Bosev. He requested information about the conditions under which the former minister of state administration, Mr. Dimitar Kalchev, signed a contract with Microsoft Company for the purchase of software licenses for the needs of the state administration, as well as a copy of the document itself. Read more

October 2007: Transparency of Municipal Expenses
The proceedings, initiated by the Editor in Chief of Noroden Glas (People’s Voice) newspaper at the town of Lovech, against the refusal of the mayor of the town to provide information, were stayed for the third time. According to the mayor, the requested information about the amount paid by the municipality for announcements in four media was protected data of the third parties. During the proceedings, it turned out that the representatives of the municipality did not know who was contacted in terms of these announcements and to whom the public money was paid after all. Two court sessions were necessary to clear out that issue. The Administrative Court in Lovech took the legal measure to sanction the municipal legal officer for not complying with court instructions within the time frames. At the last session, it turned out that the municipality had not signed contracts with the four media, which had dissented the provision of information about the amount of money they were paid from the budget. The pleadings of the parties will be heard on December 4, 2007. The case is supported by AIP.

October 2007: The Tacit Refusal is Legally Unacceptable!
With a decision as of October 2007, the Administrative Court in Yambol repealed the tacit refusal of the Mayor of Yambol. Three times during the year, the Mayor of the Municipality of Yambol had instructed the journalist Diana Boncheva from the local newspaper Tundza to particularize her request for access to information. The journalist particularized two times that she wanted access to the documents related to the presence of the mayor at his working place for a certain period of time. After the third “misunderstanding” of the request, the refusal of the mayor was challenged in the court. The court repealed the tacit refusal as an unacceptable legal phenomenon.

October 11, 2007: Approved Projects Under ISPA Should Be Public
On October 11, 2007, the Sofia City Court reviewed the complaint of Mr. Ivailo Hlebarov from the Environmental Association For the Earth against the refusal of the Ministry of Environment and Waters to provide documents under the ISPA Program of the European Union. Among the requested documents were the application forms, reports from the researches, the cost-and-benefit analyses, and the financial memoranda of the approved projects. According to the grounds stated by the ministry, the majority of those documents may not be provided since some of the tender procedures had not been completed. The complainant, as well as his legal representative Alexander Kashumov from AIP, emphasized the ambiguity of the argument. On one hand, the necessity for maximum transparency of the infrastructure projects, financed from the EU funds, is undoubted (including highways, the Vidin-Kalafat Bridge, Airport Sofia, etc). On the other hand, the submitted documents regarding already approved projects under the ISPA have no relation to following tender procedures. The court shall deliver a decision within 30 days.

Sessions of the Council for Electronic Media Shall be Transparent
The Sofia City Court shall decide within a month on the complaint of the Bulgarian Media Coalition against a refusal of the Council for Electronic Media (CEM). The CEM refused access to the discussions, which had led to the adoption of methods and evaluation criteria for applicants for radio and television licenses. According to the Council, the requested information was preparatory and included opinions of its members, which gave grounds for refusal under Art. 13, Para. 2, item 1 of the APIA. The Council also refused access to the application forms on the ground of trade secret. Since the CEM is a body with public functions and its sessions shall be public pursuant to the Radio and Television Law, the quoted exemption to the right of access is inapplicable. Unfilled application documents may not be anyone’s trade secret, according to the legal team of AIP.

Shall we Know About the Petrolgate Case?
Does the society have the right to know about the findings in the President’s report on the Petrolgate case? The answer of that question will become clear with the decision of the Sofia City Court on the case of Politika newspaper journalist Zoya Dimitrova. In 2006, the Supreme Administrative Court returned the file of the case for reconsideration to the first instance after giving explicit instructions for a review of the lawfulness of the classification of the report as state secret. The evidence collected showed that classification stamps were put, but they did not prove the grounds for the classification. An impression remained that the report, prepared by the secret services, did not contain the alleged secret data about the means for information collection, but findings of public interest. The report was prepared at the request of the President of the Republic of Bulgaria as a reaction to publications in an Arab newspaper about the trade involvement of Bulgarian companies, close to the Bulgarian Socialist Party, with Saddam Hussein’s regime in violation with the UN imposed embargo. A court decision shall be delivered till the end of November.

September 20, 2007: How Much Does the Repair of the Prime Minister’s Office Cost?
On September 20, 2007, a panel of the Administrative Court, Sofia, heard and scheduled for judgment a case against the refusal of the Director of the Government Information Services (GIS) to provide information about the repair works in the office of the Prime Minister in 2007. The refusal was issued in June 2007 after the request of the journalist Pavlina Trifonova from 24 Hours daily newspaper. As a response to her request, she received a letter from the Director of the GIS, which informed her that the repair works had been completed after signing a contract with the winner in a tender procedure under the Regulation for Assigning Special Public Procurements. The letter also contained scarce information on some of the requested points. With regard to the overall expenses of the repair works, the bids of the competing companies, as well as the price of each item bought in terms of the repair works, the Director of the GIS refused information on the grounds of Art. 37, Para. 2 of the Access to Public Information Act claiming that the information would have affected the interests of third parties and that they had not expressed their written consent for the provision of information. Besides, according to the Director of the GIS, the participants in the tender procedure for the assignment of the special public procurement had pointed out that part of the information in the bid was confidential. A court decision shall be delivered within 30 days.

On July 2, 2007, a Five-member panel of the Supreme Administrative Court (SAC) upheld a previous court decision which had repealed the refusal of the Nuclear Regulatory Agency to provide information about the March 1, 2006 incident in the Nuclear Power Plant “Kozlodui.” The Bulgarian public learned about the incident from publications in German newspapers. According to the then Minister of Economics and Energy, Mr. Rumen Ovcharov, the incident was of a first degree and its announcement was not obligatory. An ad hoc commission, however, found that the incident was of a second degree and its announcement had been obligatory. In May 2006, the National Movement Ekoglasnost requested access to information about the measures taken with regard to the incident. The Nuclear Regulatory Agency provided the reports regarding the incident, but refused the annexes on the ground that the third party dissented the provision of information, the nuclear power plant being the third part. In February 2007, a Three-member panel of the SAC repealed the refusal, emphasizing that the dissent of the third party was not by itself a ground for refusal. The rights and interests of the third party should be indeed harmed or threatened, which was not the situation in the current case. The representative of the Nuclear Power Plan presented parts of a contract with a Russian company for design, development and putting into exploitation a control rods system, which stopped functioning on March 1, 2006. According to the contract, everything related to its implementation, was confidential.
With its decision, the Five-member panel repealed the arguments of the Nuclear Regulatory Agency and the Power Plant and upheld that the request for the consent of the third party did not give grounds for the refusal of information, which was public by nature. The court proceedings were supported by AIP.

In a final decision, as of June 28 2007, a Three-member panel of the SAC upheld the right of the journalist from bTV, Genka Shikerova, to obtain access to requested documents. The journalist started court proceedings against the refusal of the Mayor of the Municipality of Nesebar to provide access to orders about transference of property rights and granting of construction rights to people in need. Journalistic investigation revealed that state officials and people from the judicial power in the region were among “the indigent.” The reason for the submission of the request by the journalist was her interest in the particular grounds on which those people were defined as having housing needs. The Mayor did not respond within the legally prescribed time frames. However, in a belated decision, he motivated a refusal with the protection of third parties’ personal data. In November 2006, the Regional Court of Burgas repealed the refusal as illegal. A three-member panel of the SAC upheld the decision of the first instance, rejecting the argument of the appellant – the Municipality of Nesebar – that the journalist had requested the same information twice. The judges stated that if the institution had not provided information at a request the first time it was submitted, the institution did not have the right to claim that it had responded to the same request within the last six months. AIP provided legal help during the litigation. At the 2006 Right to Know Day Awards Ceremony, Genka Shikerova was given the “Golden Key” Award in the category of a journalist who had most actively used the Access to Public Information Act.

In its decision, as of June 11, 2007, the Supreme Administrative Court (SAC) upheld the decision of the Sofia City Court (SCC) which had repealed the tacit refusal of the Director of the National Intelligence Services (NIS) to provide journalist Hristo Hristov access to documents related the murder of the Bulgarian dissident writer Georgi Markov. In its decision, the SAC rejected the arguments stated by the NIS in the court appeal. The justices assumed that the legislator did not exclude the NIS from the bodies obliged to provide information to the citizens under the Access to Public Information Act. The right of access may be subject to restriction if the requested information was classified. Even in those cases, the justices emphasized, citizens had the right to receive the requested information. In cases under Art. 34, Para. 3 of the Protection of Classified Information Act (PCIA), when the time period for the protection of classified information had expired, the status of classification should be removed. According to the justices, the Sofia City Court had rightly raised the question why, considering the existing circumstances, the information had not been submitted to the State Archive pursuant to Art. 33, Para. 2 of the PCIA. The argument of the NIS that the information was not public since foreign persons’ interests were affected had been rejected. According to the court panel, the requested information was public since the requestor may have formed opinion about the activities of the security services during the socialist times. The court decision stated that it was not the obligation of the requestor to prove that the institution held the requested information. Thus, the argument of the NIS that it had not been proved that NIS was the institution holding the documents was ungrounded. Even the contrary, it was the institution which best knew the kind, volume and form of the information which it held and should state that in its response to the requestor under the APIA. The court decision is final.

Access to Information Programme provided the legal help to the journalist Hristo Hristov from Dnevnik daily newspaper. The court case was started in 2004 and won at a first instance in 2006. The journalist requested key documents from the First Bureau of the former State Security Services regarding the murder of the dissident writer Georgi Markov in London in 1978, which are held in the National Intelligence Services. In 2004, the journalist won a case against the then Minister of Interior, Georgi Petkanov who had refused access to the Ministry of Interior Archive. As a result of the SAC decision, Minister Petkanov provided the requested documents.

June 7, 2007: Bulgarian National Assembly passed the amendments to the Access to Public Information Act, which have been broadly discussed within the last three months. Access to Information Programme (AIP) has opposed the amendments since they were introduced in February 2007 due to their apparent contradiction to fundamental FOI standards. More...

On May 28, 2007, Access to Information Programme (AIP) presented its Annual Report Access to Information in Bulgaria 2006 at a pres conference held in the Bulgarian News Agency. AIP has been preparing the Report since the adoption of the Access to Public Information Act in 2000. The Report contains detailed analysis of changes in FOI legislation and practices; characteristics of the cases that Access to Information Programme received for legal help; results from a monitoring on the active provision of information by the institutions on their web sites; and an overview of the most interesting developments in the FOI court practices in 2006.

May 21, 2007: 68 Sign Protest Letter Against Bulgarian FOI Amendments
A letter calling on members of the Bulgarian National Assembly not to pass proposed amendments which would substantially weaken the national system for access to information was endorsed by 68 organisations and individuals from around the world. The letter, drafted by ARTICLE 19, was sent to Bulgarian legislators earlier today. Read the full text of the letter (Acrobat Reader 90Kb ) and the press release of AIP from May 16, 2007.

On 27nd April 2007 in Veliko Turnovo Access to Information Program held a one-day discussion on active provision of information, particularly publication of information on institutional web sites, with local and regional government officials from the Regions of Veliko Tarnovo, Pleven, Gabrovo and Lovech within the project Increasing Government Transparency and Accountability through Electronic Access to Information, financed by the UNDP Democratic Governance Trust Fund (DGTF). Read the conclusions and recommendations made by the participants (Acrobat Reader 57Kb )

On 26nd April 2007 in Veliko Turnovo, Access to Information Program organized a second round table Advocacy for Free Access to Information. Read the round table agenda.

On 23nd March 2007 in Montana Access to Information Program held a one-day discussion on active provision of information, particularly publication of information on institutional web sites, with local and regional government officials from the Regions of Montana, Vidin, and Vratsa within the project Increasing Government Transparency and Accountability through Electronic Access to Information, financed by the UNDP Democratic Governance Trust Fund (DGTF). Read the conclusions and recommendations made by the participants (Acrobat Reader 59Kb )

On 22nd March 2007 in Vidin Access to Information Program held a round table Advocacy for Free Access to Information with representatives of NGOs and media, as part the implementation of the project Strengthening NGOs in Their Search for Public Information, financed by PHARE Programme – 2004 Civil Society Development.

On February 2, 2007 a three-member panel of the Bulgarian Supreme Administrative Court repealed a refusal of the Nuclear Regulatory Agency (NRA). The National Movement Ekoglasnost, had filed an information request for the report and its annexes on the fifth block incident in the Nuclear Power Plant Kozlodui on March 1, 2006. The reports were disclosed, but the annexes to were refused on the grounds that the third party - the nuclear power plant itself - did not consent on the disclosure of the information. Access to Information Programme provided legal assistance to the complainant. In its decision, the judges found that it unclear why NRA presumed that legitimate interests of the NPP Kozlodui were to be affected and asked for their consent. According to the justices, the annexes contained data about the investigation just like the reports. That is why, it could not be presumed that the annexes contained any legally protected information.The Supreme Administrative Court turned the file back to the Agency for reconsideration and obligated it to comply with the Environmental Protection Act, which requires that institutions should consider the public interest when deciding whether to provide access to environmental information.

Access to Information Programme (AIP) expresses its concern about the decision of the court and the economic pressure exercised by government officials on the citizens, who exercise their right of access to information. With its decision as of December 12, 2006 the Supreme Administrative Court in Bulgaria sentenced the Center for NGOs in the town of Razgrad to pay the expenses of 3000 BGN (1500 Euro) with regards to an access to information court case. More...

September 28, 2006: For the fourth successive year Access to Information Programme organized the Right to Know Awards Ceremony in Bulgaria
Around 150 people attended the 2006 Right to Know Awards Ceremony that AIP held in the National Press club at the Bulgarian Telegraph Agency. Posters were disseminated in Sofia and the countryside through AIP's coordinators network. Press releases were sent to national and regional media. The event was broadcast live on Internet. Cups, pins, pens, T-shirts, FOIANet leaflets, and the AIP's FOI Newsletter dedicated to the Right to Know Day were distributed among all the participants of the ceremony. Special guests of the Right to Know Day ceremony were Mr. Nikolay Vasilev, Minister of State Administration and Administrative Reform, Ms. Carmen Gonsalves, a counsellor at the Royal Netherlands Embassy in Bulgaria, and Mr. Neil Buhne, the UN Resident Coordinator in Bulgaria. More info

Access to Information Programme presented its Annual Report Access to Information in Bulgaria 2005 on May 12, 2006. Journalists, clients, friends, and partners of AIP attended the conference held at the Bulgarian Telegraph Agency. What were the changes in FOI legislation and practices in Bulgaria in 2005? What were the characteristics of the cases that Access to Information Programme received for legal help? Did state institutions and local government bodies fulfil their legal obligations to publish information on their Internet sites? What type of information did citizens seek? What were the most interesting developments in the FOI court practices in 2005? You will find answers to all of these questions, as well as detailed analysis of the related issues, in the annual report of AIP Access to Information in Bulgaria 2005.

In the beginning of 2006 Access to Information Programme published the third volume of Access to Information Litigation in Bulgaria. Selected cases. The book is divided into two parts - analytical text, written by Alexander Kashumov and Kiril Terziiski, and ten full court cases. The Bulgarian Access to Public Information Act has not established an independent institution to overview its implementation. In view of this situation, the court practice on the implementation of the APIA becomes of great significance... Available: (Acrobat PDF 2611Kb))

International Freedom of Information Litigation Conference—Lessons Learned was held on 25-26 November 2005 in Sofia, Bulgaria. The conference was organized by Access to Information Programme Foundation with the support of the Council of Europe. Participants from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro, Rumania, Moldova, Albania, Hungary, the Check Republic, Armenia, Georgia, the Netherlands, and the USA would visit Sofia to take part in the event.

The conference covered the following main topics: Freedom of Information Litigation –General Overview; FOI Litigation as Advocates Strategy; Challenging Freedom of Information Exemptions though Litigation; Effects of Freedom of Information Litigation. Read more.

Access to Information Program (AIP) has organized the celebration of the International Right to Know Day on 28 September for the third successive year. The ceremony was held in Mati hall in the National Palace of Culture. Positive and negative awards were given in eight categories. Read more.

Denial to disclose the controversial Trakia Highway concession appealed with the help of AIP
A journalist has started FOI court proceedings on Friday, 3 June 2005, with the help of Access to Information Programme The news was spread out by "Novinar" newspaper on Monday. The appeal is against a denial of the Minister of Regional Development and Public Works to disclose the concession contract of Trakia highway. The case about this contract became quite scandalous in Bulgaria, since there was no tender procedure. NGOs and politicians shared publicly serious suspicions of corruption. There was unofficial information that the Prime minister's family had some indirect participation in the company taking the concession and that the Bulgarian government undertook heavy responsibilities to pay reparations to the company in case there would not be enough highway traffic during the concession period of 35 years. The concerns were so serious, that recently Frankfurter Algemeine Zeitung informed that the European Investment Bank is reconsidering its financing strategy for the construction of part of the motorway. The EIB vice president confirmed the position.

In the course of media search for more information, the daily newspaper "Dnevnik" consulted by AIP, discovered that the Government failed to practically organize the public register of concessions data. Later a journalist from "Novinar" newspaper filed a FOI request for the contract and related documents to the Minister who had signed the contract. After the Minister denied access on grounds of "office secret“, the disclosure of which threatens to"unduly harm the interests of the state and other interests," the journalist appealed the denial to the Court.

Sixteen European civil society organizations joined the Justice Initiative on April 12, 2005 in calling on the Council of Europe to adopt a new binding instrument entrenching the right to access information throughout Europe. The text of the letter is available here.

The final version of the report "Access to Information in Bulgaria 2004" is available. The purpose of this report is to summarize the developments in the freedom of information legislation and its implementation. The problems of the implementation of the right to information access outlined by the reporting team allow us to make certain conclusions on a practical and political level, in an attempt to improve the practices of providing access to information. This is the reason why this report starts with recommendations for the legislative and executive bodies of power in Bulgaria. This Report is published within the framework of the project "Implementation of Freedom of Information in Bulgaria", implemented by Access to Information Programme with cooperation of VVMZ East European Investment Services B.V. (NL) and financially supported by the Programme for Social Transformation in Central and East Europe (MATRA) of the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The full text of the report in English can be viewed here.

The annual “Big Brother” anti-awards presented in Bulgaria 13 April 2005

Access to Information Programme Foundation and Internet Society Bulgaria presented the annual “Big Brother” anti-awards for the violation of the right to privacy and the protection of personal data at an official ceremony in the “The Red House—Center for Culture and Debate” on 13 April 2005.

The award “Big Brother” was founded by Privacy International—a human rights group working for the protection of privacy. “Big Brother” awards are bestowed to these institutions, which directly or by establishing requirements and rules, seriously violate people’s privacy and the right to protection of personal data. The symbol of the anti-award is a military boot smashing a human head more...

Access to Information Programme prepared the first version of a Report on Access to Information, Public Participation and Access to Justice on Environmental Matters. The report, which is currently under review by NGOS, officials and scientists, was prepared using the methodology of The Access Initiative of the World Resources Institute.The national team, working on the project in Bulgaria, comprised Alexander Kashumov, Darina Palova, Gergana Jouleva, Kiril Terzijski, and Nikolay Marekov from Access to Information Programme and Petar Radev and Stoyan Yotov from “Borrowed Nature” Association. Diana Bancheva (AIP) worked on the English version of the project resume, available here: Acrobat PDF (226Kb).
We would also like to thank the external experts, who took part in the development of the report:
- Alexander Assenov, Black Sea Center for Environmental Information and Education,
- Petar Penchev, president of the National Movement “Ekoglasnost” - Montana,
- Yurij Ivanov, president of Civil Association “Public Barometer” - Sliven, Water facilities in Sliven.

The Freedom of Information Advocates Network (FOIAnet) celebrates the international Right to Know Day. On a press conference on Sep. 28 AIP presented awards to citizens, media and NGOs, who have actively exercised their rights to freedom of information. Two awards - a positive and a negative one - will be given to institutions. More information on the way FOIAnet members celebrated on September 28 can be found here.

On Sep. 28, 2004 the Justice Initiative has released the executive summary of its 2003 Pilot FOI Monitoring Report. The full report will be released shortly. The 2004 16-country monitoring is already well advanced and results will be released much more quickly than with this pilot. The study was carried out in partnership with FOI Advocates network members: Access to Information Program (AIP), Bulgaria, Freedom of Information Center, Armenia, Instituto Prensa y Sociedad (IPYS, Press and Society Institute), Peru, Open Democracy Advice Centre (ODAC), South Africa, Pro Media, Macedonia. And all involved in the 2003 and 2004 monitoring know that nothing could have been done without our consultant Tom Carson who has been incredibly dedicated to this project and developing this excellent tool for monitoring access to information. This report shows that although progress is made, still much work has to be done in promoting implementation of FOI laws. Read the executive summary: Acrobat PDF (211Kb).

Government transparency under scrutiny in South-East Europe. How Southeast European countries plagued by corruption and low public trust in government can benefit from greater transparency was the subject of discussion in Budva, Montenegro, on September 9-10, at a seminar featuring government officials and civil society groups from across the region. More...

AIP has published the report "Access to Information in Bulgaria 2003". The purpose of this report is to summarize the developments in the freedom of information legislation and its implementation. The problems of the implementation of the right to information access outlined by the reporting team allow us to make certain conclusions on a practical and political level, in an attempt to improve the practices of providing access to information. This is the reason why this report starts with recommendations for the legislative and executive bodies of power in Bulgaria. This Report is published within the framework of the project "Implementation of Freedom of Information in Bulgaria", implemented by Access to Information Programme with cooperation of VVMZ East European Investment Services B.V. (NL) and financially supported by the Programme for Social Transformation in Central and East Europe (MATRA) of the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The full text of the report in English can be viewed here Acrobat PDF (308Kb) .

On May 14-15 in Sofia AIP organized a Regional Conference "Advocacy for Freedom of Information - Independent Monitoring". A number of organizations focusing on monitoring and advocacy for FOI implementation presented their experience in the area. The conference was financially supported by the Council of Europe/Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe. More...

Following an information request and a court appeal by a Hristo Hristov, a Bulgarian journalist, the five-member panel of the Supreme Administrative Court (SAC) obliged the Minister of Interior (MI) to provide access to archival documents. While studying the facts surrounding the assassination of the Bulgarian journalist Georgi Markov in London in the 1970s, Mr. Hristov requested access to MI archival documents containing security services files about the Bulgarian units of BBC, Free Europe and Deusche Welle. Initially the Minister did not respond to the information request, but than claimed that such documents were not kept in the archive of the Ministry of Interior. The appeal against the refusal was filed with the assistance of AIP but was rejected by the three-member panel of SAC. A week ago (on May 05) the five-member panel of Supreme Administrative Court reversed the first-instance decision and obliged the respondent to provide access to the requested information. The court believed that the presented evidence on the case proved the existence of the requested information in the MI archives and the journalist had already read some of the related documents of the former security services. Even if part of the documents had not been available, under the procedures of the Access to Public Information Act the Ministry of Interior had to indicate where they could be found. The peremptory judgment of the second-instance court is notable because instead of returning the file to the respondent for reconsideration, it decided the case in substance and obliged the Minister to provide full access to the requested information. Description of the case can be found here.

The five-member panel of the Supreme administrative court of Bulgaria confirmed the decision of the three-member panel on administrative case № 3080/2003. The decision of the three-member panel had reversed the refusal of the Minister of Finance to disclose a copy of the contract between the Ministry and Crown Agents to Kiril Terziiski. The court file has been referred back to the Minister of Finance, who is now obliged to reconcider the information request. The court decision is final and is not subject to further appeal. More...

Bulgarian Access to Information Litigation 2003. We have sumamrized the most important court cases for 2003 in which Access to Information Programme has provided legal assistance, including representation in court.

Available: PDF (78Kb) , HTML

AIP published a handbook "How to Get Access to Environmental Information" with the support by a grant from the Regional Environmental Center of Central and Eastern Europe and with the support of te Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands within the Regional Environment Reconstruction Programme for South Eastern Europe (REReP). Available: Acrobat Reader PDF (253kb)

Read here The Right to Know is Gaining around the World - an article by Thomas S. Blanton, director of the National Security Archive at George Washington University in Washington D.C., and managing editor of www.freedominfo.org, a web network of international access advocates in International Herald Tribune.

On 28 September 2002 Freedom of Information organizations from various countries around the globe meeting in Sofia, Bulgaria, created a network of Freedom of Information Advocates (FOIA Network) and agreed to collaborate in promotion of the individual right of access to information and open, transparent governance. The group of FOI Advocates also proposed that 28 September be nominated as international "Right to Know Day" in order to symbolize the global movement for promotion of the right to information. The aim of having a Right to Know Day is to raise awareness of the right to information. It is a day on which freedom of information activists from around the world can use further to promote this fundamental human right and to campaign for open, democratic societies in which there is full citizen empowerment and participation in government. On a press conference on Sep. 28 AIP will present awards to citizens, media and NGOs, who have actively exercised their rights to freedom of information. Two awards - a positive and a negative one - will be given to institutions. More information on the nominations and the ceremony can be found here (in Bulgarian).

Supreme Administrative Court of Bulgaria demands the contract with Crown Agents. A three-member panel of the Supreme Administrative Court (SAC) in a hearing from June 03 decided to request officially the contract between the Bulgarian
government and the British consultancy company Crown Agent, hired to conduct reforms in the Bulgarian customs system. SAC requested the contract in relation to an appeal filed in October 2002 against a decision of the Minister of Finance to refuse access to the full text of the contract, involving about 14,500,000 USD. The information request had been filed by Kiril
Terziiski, an attorney-at-law at AIP.The Supreme Administrative Court will review the contract in a private hearing, in
order to decide whether the refusal of the Minister of Finance was lawful.

Amendments to the Access to Public Information Act were passed at first hearing in Parliament on Thursday, May 8, 2003. Access to Information Programme actively participated in the process of promoting the adoption of the Amending Act. AIP has held several discussions on the draft with the MPs, who introduced it into Parliament. AIP members have participated and expressed their opinions on all discussions of the three responsible Parliamentary Committees (Civil Society Affairs Committee, Human Rights and Religious Affairs Committee, and Legal Affairs Committee). The conformity of the Amending Act to the recently adopted Recommendation (2002)2 of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe was discussed on a round table in May, 2002. The round table was organized by AIP with the help of the Media Division of the Council of Europe and financial support of the Government of Luxemburg for journalists, MPs, international experts, and jurists.

Here are the most important changes that the Amending Act will make if adopted:
1 . A more precise definition of the term "public information". Public information will be any information kept, received or created by the obliged institutions, which does not constitute state secret or other secret set down in law.
2. Further specification of the range of institutions, obliged to provide access to public information under the Act. The Amending Act would explicitly oblige territorial branches of the executive power, besides the central institutions. The reason for this amendment is the developed practice of the territorial branches to forward information requests to the central institutions, instead of examining them. Heads of the territorial departments have repeatedly argued, they are not obliged under the Act, but only central institutions are.
3. Media will no longer be obliged to provide access to information under the new Act.
4. Article 14, para. 2 item 3 of the current act will be amended to include the so called "balance of interests" principle. According to this international standard, the right to information access cannot be denied formally (i.e. solely on the basis of some legal provision). Instead, the Act provides an opportunity for the officials to disclose certain categories of information, when the public interest prevails over the interest that a certain prevention form access would protect.
5. The amending act provides for a limitation of the period, in which preparatory documents under art. 13 para. 2 item 1 of APIA can be exempt from access, only to the moment of publishing the final act. This proposed change is of great importance, because one of the main purposes of APIA is to create opportunities for public participation in the decision-making process and for informed criticism of the decisions taken.
6. The new Act make an amendment in article 41 of APIA, which will allow information access to be provided to the requestors on the basis of a court decision only. Until now, following a favorable court decision, requestors had to renew the application procedure (i.e., to file a new, separate request) in order to actually receive information access.
7. Introduction of an administrative procedure for appealing both decisions to disclose and refusals to grant information. Until now appeals against refusals to grant information access could only be filed in court.
8. The fine in cases when officials refuse to issue a decision on an information request, or to abide to a court decision are nearly doubled in the Amending Act.
9. Introduction of a six-month period form the adoption of The Amending Act, in which all regional and central institutions have to appoint a specific official responsible for APIA issues. At the same time (and in the same six-month term) institutions have to appoint places or reading rooms, where created or received documents will be kept.

Ninety MPs voted for the adoption of the Act and two were against from a total of 102 voters. Read the text of the amendments, the reasons of the presenters, and the opinion of the AIP team here.

With the assistance of AIP Ivaylo Ganchev has won administrative court case 8518/2002 in front of the Supreme Administrative Court of Bulgaria. The citizen appealed a refusal of the Minister of Science and Education (MSE) to present documents in relation to renting parts of the lobby of the Ministry for commercial purposes. Violating the procedures of the State Property Act and the Regulation on its Implementation, the Minister had given parts of the lobby to a private company, which had placed advertising banners. Read more...

The Year of the Rational Ignorance Access to Information Programme presents the report of the sociological survey Fulfillment of the Obligations under APIA by the bodies of the Executive power 2002. The report is published in the frame of the project "Practical Access to Democracy in Central and Eastern Europe" implemented with the leading role of Article 19 with the financial support of the European Initiatve for Democracy and Human Rights. Read the full text here Acrobat PDF (208Kb) .

Access to Information Programme has published its book Access to Information Litigation in Bulgaria. Selected Cases. We have chosen the most important court appeals in the field of access to information in Bulgaria. The introduction to the book was written by Alexander kashumov and edited by Gergana Jouleva. Read the full text here Acrobat PDF (732Kb) .

"Implementation of the Freedom of Information Laws. Litigation" was the topic of a workshop organized by AIP in the frame of the project "Freedom of Information Litigation", financially supported by Open Society Institute - Budapest. Participants were lawyers from countries, where the right to access is regulated by law (Bulgaria, Georgia, Moldova, Romania, Slovakia, Hungary, USA, Mexico etc.) as well as countries where Access to Information Laws are about to be adopted (Armenia, Macedonia, Russia, Croatia, Montenegro, etc.). The participants presented the FOI regulations in their countries, the practices on access to information, and litigation. See the agenda of the workshop here Acrobat PDF (32Kb) .

The essay "The Access to Information Programme: Fighting for Transparency during the Democratic Transition" by Gergana Jouleva, executive director of AIP has been published on the online network of freedom of information advocates www.freedominfo.org. This site is a one-stop portal that describes best practices, consolidates lessons learned, explains campaign strategies and tactics, and links the efforts of freedom of information advocates around the world. It contains crucial information on freedom of information laws and how they were drafted and implemented, including how various provisions have worked in practice. Gergana Jouleva is a member of the editorial board of www.freedominfo.org.

Alexander Kashumov, an AIP lawyer, together with the Bulgarian Media Coalition and the Bulgarian Helsenkee Committee presented a statement on the defamation case against Katia Kassabova of Compass newspaper by Article19 the Global Campaign for Free Expression. Read the statement here.

A round table "Access to Public Information Act and the Recommendations of the Council of Europe" was held on May 21 in Radisson hotel in Sofia. AIP organized the forum with the financial support of the Government of Luxemburg. Journalists, MPs, foreign experts, and jurists discussed the proposed Ammendments of APIA and Recommendation R(2002)2 of the Committee of Ministers to member states on access to official documents.

Access to Information Programme has published in English its report "The Current Situation of the Access to Public Information in Bulgaria 2001". The report is available here. (Acrobat Reader (249Kb) .

On May 10, 2002 Access to Information Programme Foundation organized a seminar "The condition of the access to information in Bulgaria" Adacta Hall of Rila Hotel. AIP presented the Persobal Data protection Act, The protection of Classified Information Act, Recommendation R(2002)2 of the Committee of Ministers to member states on access to official documents, and the draft amendments in APIA. During the second part of the seminar the team of AIP presented the Register of Administrative Structures and Acts of Executive Power Bodies. Concrete cases and court appeals were also discussed.

Access to Information Programme organized a training workshop "Application of Access to Public Information Act (APIA)" on 19 April 2002 starting at 09:30h in hotel "Zitomir", Montana. The participants in the seminar were representatives from the local administration and territorial branches of the executive power from the regions Vidin, Vraca and Montana.

Access to Information Programme Foundation organized a training workshop "Application of Access to Public Information Act (APIA)" on March 29, 2002 in Grand Hotel "Veliko Tarnovo", Veliko Tarnovo. You can find detailed information here.

The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe has adopted a recommendation on access to official documents on February 21, 2002. The text of the Recommendation and its Explanatory memorandum can be found here.

Acess to Information Programme together with American Bar Association-CEELI organizes a series of training workshops for the local administration and the regional branches of the central administration on the Fulfillment of the obligations under APIA. The first training was held in Plovdiv on March 15, 2002. On March 29, 2002 the team will be in Veliko Turnovo.

On January 11, 2002 in Adacta Hall in Rila Hotel AIP presented the survey "Fulfillment of the obligations under APIA by the Bodes of the Executive Power", accomplished by Access to Information Programme and Agency for socio-economic analysis. The report on this survey is published within the frame of the project Advocacy for the implementation of APIA and judicial review with the finical support of the Open Society Foundation - Sofia.

Access to Information Programme Foundation celebrated its fifth birthday with a press-conference and a workshop. On November 16 in Adacta hall of Rila hotel the team of AIP presented its comments on the Personal Data Protection Draft Act and the Draft Law on the Protection of Information, Classified as State or Official secret.

The Parliament of Bulgaria adopted the Personal Data Protection Act. The act provides for the usage of such information. The team of Access to Information Programme has prepared comments on the draft Act, which can be seen here.

Amending Act to the Access to Public Information Act was introdiced in Parliament by group of members of Parliament: Borislav Tsekov, Valentin Tserovski, Nikolai Buchkov, Rupen Krikoryan, Emil Koshlukov, Husein Chaush on 27.11.2001. Read the text of the amendments, the reasons of the presenters, and the opinion of the AIP team here.