Next week, an international regional partnership in the field of freedom of information will be launched: “The Freedom of Information Partnership of the Asian Countries”, in which the State of Israel will be a partner as one of the founders alongside the countries of the Philippines, Taiwan, Sri Lanka, the Maldives and Indonesia. The purpose of the partnership is to create cooperation at the international-regional level in the field of freedom of information, in order to increase the implementation of the freedom of information law in the member states, strengthening the value of transparency, etc. Israel’s representative and the person who led the move is the governmental unit for freedom of information in the Ministry of Justice.
Today, there are other international regional organizations, such as in Latin America and Africa, for the regional promotion of freedom of information, and against this background, an initiative by the Philippines to establish a similar regional partnership of Asian countries began, and its request in this regard was recently received by the governmental unit for freedom of information, in the Ministry of Justice. The idea behind the initiative is to contact official freedom of information bodies in a limited number of countries that express their desire, and to establish an international regional partnership in which each country will have the status of a founder and then allow the joining of additional countries in the Asian continent, according to formal rules that the founders will decide on.
Regarding this issue, there has been extensive correspondence between the representatives of the countries in recent times, in which the representatives of the governmental unit for freedom of information and the unit for foreign relations in the Ministry of Justice were integrated, as well as representatives of the international department in the consulting and legislation department and representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, mainly regarding the legal aspects concerning this.
Following this, a signing ceremony for the foundation of the partnership was scheduled, which will take place on Wednesday, September 28, with the participation of the representatives of the Philippines, Taiwan, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, the Maldives and Israel, in which the representatives of the founding countries will speak, and then the representatives of the world organization and the other regional partnerships will speak .
Attorney Shlomi Bilevsky, head of the governmental unit for freedom of information in the Ministry of Justice: “The establishment of the partnership and the appeal to Israel, as well as the willingness of Indonesia – with whom we do not have diplomatic relations – to join the initiative, is a real step forward. This is the beginning of a path that will later be joined by other countries when Israel will have a leading position by virtue of being one of the founders. We see this as an excellent opportunity To share and leverage the great work of the unit on the issue of freedom of information and the projects it has led, some of which are world-class precedents such as the reflection of government expenditures on a quarterly basis and in an open file. The foundation of the partnership proves that the value of transparency and freedom of information is a value that can be used as a bridge between different countries and we are convinced that the partnership has great potential on all levels many”.