Following two requests of information under the right of access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents concerning EUTFA-funded projects currently implemented in Libya by IOs, ASGI received unsatisfying and poorly reasoned answers from the European Union.
The European Union Emergency Trust Fund for Africa (EUTF) is a financial tool that helps to implement different migration and development-related projects across various regions in Africa. Albeit the EUTF has brought improvements compared to the previous European Union funding of external migration and development policy, several problems arise regarding priority setting and sustainability of the fund.
This Article deals with the EUTF and related criticisms and examines two of its projects currently implemented in Libya. Thereby, it aims to shed light on different problems concerning the right to access of information as provided in Regulation (EC) 1049/2001 as well as certain organizational aspects of the EUTF in general.
Therefore, an analysis examining the information provided by the EU following two requests of information submitted by the Association for Legal Studies on Immigration (ASGI) in 2018 and 2019 is conducted. The evaluation reveals that the EU withholds a wide range of information, often without or only poor reasoning and does not fulfil its obligation to answer withing a certain time-limit. This contributes to an impeded access to information and a lack of transparency and thus to difficulties for the civil society to effectively monitor the work of the EUTF. Considering the information provided or rather not provided by the EU, I finally conclude that the EUTF lacks both control over implementing partners and a human-rights focus in its monitoring system.
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