The Anti-Corruption Council submitted its Report on unlawful classification of data secrecy based on the Regulation on office operation of state administration bodies to the Government on 3 August 2016. Also, the Constitutional Court was addressed with an initiative to assess the compliance of the provision of conformity of the Regulation with the Constitution and the laws.

The report can be found here.

The Initiative can be found here.

The Council notes that in April 2016 the Government adopted a bylaw which inputs another degree of classification into existing classification of data secrecy set by the Law, without clear criteria for labeling documents with that new degree. In addition to the existing degrees set by the Data Secrecy Law (Top Secret, Secret, Confidential and Restricted), the Government introduced the degree of secrecy “Official”.

Any restriction of access to the information of public importance that is not envisaged by Law on Data Secrecy Law is a violation of the Constitution and laws of the Republic of Serbia. This does not only endanger the right to access the information of public importance, which is guaranteed by the Constitution and laws, as it also enables concealing information which are important for the fight against corruption.