European Ombusman gains access to Greek crisis documents

The action has come after a complaint lodged by a German journalist who had previously only been given partial access to the documents.

The Ombudsman, Emily O'Reilly said in a statement on Tuesday that "Especially in times of crisis, it is vital that the European public understand how important decisions affecting their lives came about. Europe is still tangibly affected by these decisions and the role of the different players needs to be clear to be able to learn lessons for the future."

The Ombudsman, was being a little kind, since it was back in November 2011, that the German journalist asked the Commission for access to documents drafted between January 1999 and June 2000 concerning Greece's entry into the Eurozone.

The journalist wanted to see all documents on the Greek conversion reports, as well as preparatory documents, letters, and e-mails between different Commission services, the Greek authorities, and the authorities of other EU member states. The relevant Commission services included the Cabinet of the then Commission President Romano Prodi, other Commissioners' cabinets, and Directorates-General, as well as the Secretariat-General. As he got only very limited access to srequested documents and was brushed off the journalist turned to the Ombudsman in April 2012.

The Commission explained that its delay was due to the complexity of the request and stressed that some of the relevant documents dated back to a period when electronic registering did not yet exist.

It was only after the Ombudsman opened her investigation and inspected the relevant files, that the Secretariat-General of the Commission launched an action plan to speed up the access request identifying 140 documents and releasing all of them to the journalist.