The report prepared by the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BiRN) provides findings on governmental transparency and accountability in the Western Balkans. It lists institutions from the region from best to worst practices to grant access to freedom of information, focusing on response to journalists’ requests. It presents that faced with the global COVID-19 pandemic, the Western Balkans did not prioritize freedom of information. Most of the countries had limited access to information, particularly during the imposed state of emergency. Moreover, the region continues to struggle to implement Freedom of Information (FOI) laws and is not succeeding in becoming more transparent and accountable to its citizens. It reflects that the European Commission reports for 2020 for the Balkan countries also criticized the low level of institutional transparency and expressed concerns about the dysfunctionality of the legal mechanisms. Read more here.
Source: Balkan Insight