Press Releases - Archive

The Commissioner for Information of Public Importance and Personal Data Protection sent today to the Serbian Government 7 requests by which he requires of the Government to act in accordance with the duties under Article 28, paragraph 4 of the Law on Free Access to Information and enforce the decisions passed by the Commissioner in acting on complaints lodged against the Public Enterprise "Srbijagas" (state-owned natural gas provider in Serbia) by which he ordered provision of the requested information of public importance.

The Commissioner for Information of Public Importance and Personal Data Protection and the Law School at the University of Belgrade (Commissioner Rodoljub Sabic and Dean Professor Sima Avramovic, Phd.) concluded today the Agreement on Cooperation, i.e. agreement on joint engagement in practical training for students at the Commissioner's Office.

Under the Agreement the Commissioner will organize a practical training programme at his Office in organizational units acting on complaints regarding freedom of information and dealing with harmonization of regulations in this field with the EU standards.

Deputy Commissioner for Information of Public Importance and Personal Data Protection Aleksandar Resanović took part in a round table in honour of the Data Protection Day organised by the Slovenian Information Commissioner on 28 January 2016 in Ljubljana at the hall of the Slovenian National Assembly.

The round table was also attended by Ms Mojca Prelesnik, Slovenian Information Commissioner, Prof. Denis Čaleta, President of the Institute for Corporative Security Studies in Ljubljana, Ms Tatjana Bobnar, Deputy Director General of the Slovenian Police, Mr. Boštjan Vidmar, a representative of the Institute for Development of Remote Piloted Aerial Systems in Ljubljana, Dr. Aleš Završnik of the Institute of Criminology at Faculty of Law in Ljubljana, and Mr. Lenart Kunič, journalist of the "Delo" newspaper.

In his letter sent to Ms Kori Udovički, Minister of Public Administration and Local Self-Government, the Commissioner for Information of Public Importance and Personal Data Protection warned about a specific and increasingly common practice observed in the implementation of the Law on Free Access to Information of Public Importance and asked for relevant remedial measures to be undertaken in order to address the issue.

The Commissioner believes that situations in which information requesters are asked to make their requests "formally correct" or to "specify" the subject matter of the request due to alleged "inaccuracy" or "formal incorrectness", even where this is clearly not the case, harm the reputation of the public administration and undermine efforts to restore citizens' trust in its work. Particularly worrying is the fact that such situations have occurred even in cases where the existence and title of the document to which an information request relates are common knowledge.

All those who work in the public administration have a crucial duty to facilitate the exercise of citizens' rights, instead of making it more difficult and complicated by resorting to devices that are often akin to chicanery.

In this context, the Commissioner would like to reiterate that any unlawful prevention of the exercise of the right of access to information is also an infringement punishable under the law (Article 46, item 12 of the Law on Free Access to Information of Public Importance).