Europol bows to Ombudman’s calls for more openness

Date: 27/07/00

By John Shelley

EUROPE'S criminal intelligence agency has pledged to give the public wide-ranging rights to scrutinise its internal documents following threats of tough action by the EU Ombudsman.

Europol has finally agreed to adopt the same access to documents rules as those already followed by the Council of Ministers after repeated requests for more openness from Ombudsman Jacob Soderman.

Under the new system, the public will have the right to ask for any internal Europol document and the organisation must then either provide the text or give a detailed explanation of why it must remain confidential under clearly defined exemption rules. "What we have got at the end seems to be a very good deal," said an aide to the Ombudsman this week.

Europol originally promised to draw up an access to documents policy in 1999 after Soderman launched an 'own initiative' inquiry into its secretive approach. But the agency has been slow to live up to its pledge, failing to bring standards up to scratch despite repeated deadlines for action from the EU watchdog.

It was only after Soderman's threatened to use his ultimate sanction of preparing a special report for the European Parliament condemning the agency's stance that its management board agreed to fall in line.

Under the new rules, Europol will still be able to deny access to papers on a variety of grounds, including the need to protect investigations or because it would be against the public interest to release them. But it will have to explain why it is doing so.

Documents on policy decisions and internal performance evaluations should be in the public domain from now on, but operational details of ongoing investigations will remain secret. "Obviously there are a lot of documents that should not be made public, but I cannot believe that every document they have must be kept secret," said the Ombudsman's aide.

It will be up to Europol officials to decide whether documents are confidential, but anyone denied access to a paper must be informed of his or her right to appeal to the Ombudsman or the European Court of Justice.

Civil liberties groups have welcomed the move as a vital step towards opening up an organisation whose only previous concession to accountability was to produce an annual report for the European Parliament. They are particularly pleased that Europol has chosen to follow the Council's rules rather than draw up its own because the practical application of those rules has been well established by years of use. "At the moment this seems to be the best result possible," said Tony Bunyan, of civil liberties group Statewatch. "At least we know where we all are with the existing rules because there are plenty of precedents."

Europe's criminal intelligence agency has pledged to give the public wide-ranging rights to scrutinise its internal documents following threats of tough action by the EU Ombudsman.