The Organization of American States Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression, Catalina Botero, has released an annual report that includes a section on the right to access to information regarding human rights violations.
The 341-page report also discusses “best practices of national courts with regard to access to information in the Americas, and the principles that must be taken into account to ensure that government advertising not be used as a mechanism to exert pressure on critical or independent media or journalists.” Perhaps the bulk of the report concerns treatment of the media, with sections on individual countries that at times touch on right to information issues. Another section covers government advertising.
(See the April 15 press release and link to the report in English. See the release and link to the report in Spanish.)
The report presents “some of the court decisions that constitute best practices with respect to the protection and guarantee of the fundamental right of access to information.”
The chapter on cases “compiles judgments from different countries in the region, organized thematically according to the inter-American standards on access to information and reviewed in a manner that makes it easy to understand how each decision constitutes a local development of those regional standards.”
During 2010, according to the report, the Office of the Special Rapporteur “was encouraged by the incorporation of the inter-American system’s standards on access to information into the domestic legal regimes of several States, either through the approval of special access to information laws or through decisions by their domestic courts.” Without naming names, the report continues, “The Office of the Special Rapporteur was also encouraged by the implementation of measures by public authorities to guarantee compliance with their obligations in this area.”
“However, it can still be said that in several Member States there continue to be difficulties in regulating the exceptions to the exercise of this right and in the implementation of some laws.”
The report recommends that OAS members “continue promulgating laws that permit effective access to information and complementary norms that regulate the exercise of this right, in conformity with theinternational standards in this area,” and implement them effectively.
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