Europe: Access Info Europe and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) release a report based on showing that in most European jurisdictions data on company ownership is almost impossible for the public to obtain.
Beneficial Ownership: The Panama papers stories from the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) sparks massive reaction, too many to chronicle, but here are a few policy-related ones:
– “Civil society organizations are seizing on the leak as an occasion to renew calls for the world’s donors to protect developing countries’ domestic resources from exploitative tax havens and shell companies…” wrote Molly Anders in Devex.
– “It is time for the United States to end the secrecy around anonymous companies and help prevent the flow of illicitly acquired funds into the United States” said Claudia J. Dumas, President and CEO of TI-USA.
– Panama must be put under extra pressure by the G20 group of nations, banks, investors and trading partners to transform its financial transparency rules in the wake of the Panama Papers scandal, says the OECD, the developed economies’ organization, according to the Financial Times.
– OpenCorporates announces plans to work with Global Witness, Open Contracting Partnership, The B Team, The Web Foundation, and Transparency International to create a global public beneficial ownership register to help end anonymous companies, and the corruption and criminal activity enabled by them.
– Governments should commit to company ownership transparency in their OGP National Action Plans, according to a post by Rosie Sharpe on the OGP blog.
– With a FOIA request, the Open State Foundation has asked the Dutch Chamber of Commerce for full access to financial information on the costs and benefits of the company register.
Recordkeeping: “Great Ideas for OGP Action Plans: Bridging Access to Information and Open Data with Effective Records Management,” by Victoria L Lemieux and Anne Thurston on the OGP blog.
OGP: Germany will apply to join, tweets the OGP acting Director, Joe Powell.
IFTI Watch: Former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark, campaigning to be the next U.N. secretary-general, says she would like to see a U.N. freedom of information policy, Reuters reports.
Environmental Transparency/LAC: Negotiations on theLatin America and Caribbean agreement on Access to Information, Public Participation and Justice in Environmental Matters (Principle 10 of the Rio Declaration) is continuing, with participants at the Third Meeting of the Negotiating Committee considering a revised draft text, according to an article in Sustainable Development Policy and Practice.
United States: The White House announced that the U.S. inventory of highly enriched uranium (HEU) as of September 2013 has been declassified, according to a March 31 White House fact sheet and a UPI story.
United States: The Nuclear Vault publishes an update of its widely read December 2015 posting on the Strategic Air Command’s nuclear weapons requirements study for 1959. A number of interested readers wrote to find out whether their city or locality is on the massive list of urban-industrial complexes that was part of the SAC study. To help those and other readers, the Archive is publishing in its entirety the 306-page list included in part 1 of the study. The list in part 2 is essentially the same. The only difference would be the numbers of nuclear weapons assigned to the targets but that information was completely exempted from both lists.
United States: Digital Democracy, an online platform that offers remote access to hearings and information related to California politics, has added some key new features to keep users up-to-date and informed. The searchable online database uses voice and facial recognition to identify speakers, including those who give public comment at state legislative hearings.The new features, effective Monday, enable users to receive email alerts and access custom video storing and editing capabilities, among other tools, according to a GovTech article.
Trade Transparency: Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz says the Trans-Pacific Partnership may well be the worst trade agreement ever negotiated, and should have been negotiated openly. “This deal was done in secret with corporate interests at the table,” he said at a hearing in Canada, according to CBC.
Bahamas: The Bahamas Press Club calls on the government to pass FOI legislation.
Open Data: Interviews about the value of open data with Alka Mishra, Head of Open Data, India; Malick Tapsoba, Open Data Initiative, Burkina Faso; Fernanda Campagnucci, Head of Integrity, Sao Paulo.
Open Data: A Comprehensive List of 2500+ Open Data Portals around the World by OpenDataSoft.
World Bank: Input is invited on the beta version of its open data platform.
Open Data: Developed by MIT Media Lab and Deloitte, Data USA delivers interactive JavaScript visualizations of thousands of public data sets on jobs, income, education, and health.
Australia: “The government must resurrect the FOI watchdog it tried to kill or risk international embarrassment,” write Tim Smith, David Harper and Stephen Charles are former justices of the Supreme Court of Victoria, and members of the Accountability Round Table.
United States: Muckrock analyzes the differences between the House and Senate FOIA reform bills.
Italy: In advance of a parliamentary hearing, Diritto Di Sapere publishes a graphic displaying its concerns.
United States: The government paid about $2 million in attorneys fees and costs after losing FOIA cases last year, a government report reveals. See more on this by Lauren Harper and Nate Jones of the National Security Archive. Sign up for Harper’s weekly round-up of US FOIA news.
India: Officials in the state of Jharkhand “routinely try to stonewall information sought by applicants under the RTI act,” according tot a Times of India story. Only 5% of RTI requests are answered on time in the state,” alleged Deepesh Nirala, an RTI activist and advocate in Jharkhand high court during the session.
Open Bar: “The Fight for Transparency in Scotch Whisky” by Jake Emen in The Eater discusses restrictions that prevent producers from being fully transparent about the contents of their whisky blends, and in particular, the age of the whiskies included.
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