DG Trade and international arbitral institutions: information on meetings and correspondence

La demande est partiellement réussie.

Dear Trade,

Under the right of access to documents in the EU treaties, as developed in Regulation 1049/2001, I am requesting documents which contain the following information:

1) a list of meetings of DG Trade officials and/or representatives (including the Commissioner and the Cabinet) and representatives of international arbitral institutions (such as but not only the International Chamber of Commerce, the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce and the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes) in which the EU's foreign investment policy, and in particular Investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) was discussed (since July 2014);

2) minutes and other reports of these meetings;

3) all correspondence (including emails) between DG Trade officials and/or representatives (including the Commissioner and the Cabinet) and representatives of international arbitral institutions (such as but not only the International Chamber of Commerce, the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce and the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes) in which the EU's foreign investment policy, and in particular Investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) was discussed (since July 2014);

Yours faithfully,

Cecilia Olivet

We are out of office on Monday 20/07 and the EC will be closed on 21/07.
We will reply you on  22/07. ATD team

 

Dear Ms Olivet,
Thank you for your request for access to documents.
Unfortunately you have not indicated your postal address, required for registering and handling your request in line with the procedural requirements. Please send us your full postal address at your earliest convenience. Pending your reply, we reserve the right to refuse the registration of your request.
You may, of course, use directly the electronic form for entering your request:
http://ec.europa.eu/transparency/regdoc/...

Best regards,
DG TRADE

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Dear Trade,

Please find below the full postal address:

Transnational Institute
De Wittenstraat 25
1052 AK Amsterdam
The Netherlands

Yours faithfully,

Cecilia Olivet

Dear Madam,

Thank you for your application for access to documents, which was registered on 22/07/2015 under reference number GestDem 2015/3854.

In accordance with Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents, your application will be handled within 15 working days. The time limit will expire on 12/08/2015. In case this time limit needs to be extended, you will be informed in due course.

You have lodged your application via the AsktheEU.org website. Please note that this is a private website which has no link with any institution of the European Union. Therefore the European Commission cannot be held accountable for any technical issues or problems linked to the use of this system.

Yours faithfully,
DG TRADE

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Dear Madam,
Subject: Your application for access to documents – Ref GestDem No 2015/3854

We refer to your request for access to documents, registered under the above mentioned reference number.
Your application is currently being handled. However, we are not in a position to complete the handling of your application within the time limit of 15 working days, which expires today.
An extended time limit is needed as your application concerns documents held by different Services which must be consulted. Therefore, we have to extend the time limit with 15 working days in accordance with Article 7(3) of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 regarding public access to documents. The new time limit expires on 02/09/2015.
We apologize for this delay and for any inconvenience this may cause.

Yours faithfully,

DG TRADE

Dear Madam,
No document seems to exist which contains a list of all meetings that DG Trade officials or representatives, the Commissioner and/or staff of her cabinet have held with the institutions referred to in your request. The Commission is however willing to draft that list to the best of its ability, and provide the associated minutes and reports as requested, if identifies any. As regards the correspondence with those institutions, these have to be identified in the first place given that no exhaustive list is provided and that the matter discussed has to be examined on a case by case basis. All this requires an investigation which is rendered particularly difficult by the absence of a high number of officials potentially concerned during the holiday period. At this moment it is not possible to determine the number of documents falling under your request, but once identified these will have to be examined in order to determine if all or part of their content is covered by the exceptions laid down in Regulation 1049/2001.
The Regulation provides for a possibility to confer with applicants in order to find a fair solution when an application concerns a very large number of documents. Article 6(3) provides that "in the event of an application relating to a very long document or to very large number of documents, the institution concerned may confer with the applicant informally, with a view to finding a fair solution".
The Commission would therefore like to propose the date of 30 September to provide the documents requested.

If you have any questions concerning this proposal, you can contact us.

Thank you in advance for your understanding.
DG TRADE
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Dear DG Trade,

Thank you for the response. I appreciate the efforts in collecting the list of meetings of DG Trade with international arbitral institutions and the corresponding minutes. I accept your proposal of 30 September as a new deadline for the release of the requested documents. However, I would like to ask that it does not take longer than that to provide the information.

Yours faithfully,

Cecilia Olivet

Dear DG Trade,

The extension of the deadline agreed for a response to my access to documents request has long passed (30/09).

I kindly request you to please provide the documents requested (specified above). When can I expect a response?

Yours faithfully,

Cecilia Olivet

Dear Ms Olivet,
We apologize for the delay, due to the fact that more documents were identified in the last days that could fall under the scope of your request.
We hope to send you the reply to this request by next week.

Thank you for your understanding,
DG TRADE

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Dear DG Trade,

The extension of the deadline agreed for a response to my access to documents request has long passed (30/09).

I kindly ask you to send the documents requested
(specified above) this week.

Yours faithfully,

Cecilia Olivet

Dear Madams & Sirs,

as the deadline of your response to my access to documents request has long passed and as I haven't heard anything from you since 6 October when you indicated you would send a response by next week, would you be so kind to update me on the status of my
request? When can I expect a response?

Yours faithfully,

Cecilia Olivet

Dear Ms Olivet,
We raised the problem with the Unit in charge of the case. I hope to be able to send you the rely as soon as possible.
Thank you for your understanding,
DG TRADE

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Dear Madams and Sirs,

by online form dated 20 July 2015, the Transnational Institute (TNI) requested access, on the basis of Regulation 1049/2001 and the Code of Good Administrative Behaviour, to a list of meetings of DG Trade officials and/or representatives of international arbitral institutions in which the EU's foreign investment policy, and in particular Investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) was discussed. We also requested related minutes and correspondence.

By online form of 22 July 2015, DG Trade informed TNI that the application was correctly registered under reference number GestDem 2015/3854 and would be dealt with within 15 working days.

After that date, four messages were sent to TNI (the latest on 10 December 2015) in which the Commission consistently promised a timely
reply to the request.

To date, notwithstanding the expiration of all the time limits set by Regulation 1049/2001 and several assurances of imminent decision
on access, the European Commission has neither granted access to the requested document nor has it written to TNI denying total or partial access thereto.

In these circumstances, TNI requests to the Commission to reply to its application of 20 July 2015 by Thursday 31 December 2015 (so, two weeks from now).

Otherwise TNI may activate the procedure laid down in Article 7(4)of Regulation 1049/2001.

Yours faithfully,

Cecilia Olivet

Dear Ms Olivet,

Thank you for your message. We are currently assessing the documents and will let you have more information - if not the final reply - still before Christmas.

Best regards,
DG TRADE

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Dear Ms Olivet,

Further to our message of 18 December, we regret to not be able to send you our reply today. We are still working on the reply and it will be finalized in January.

Best regards,
DG TRADE

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Dear DG Trade,

Could you please provide an exact date for when I can expect your final reply regarding my request for information (reference number GestDem
2015/3854)?

Another month has gone by since you last promised to send a reply.

Many thanks in advance,

Cecilia Olivet

Dear Ms Olivet,

We are working on your request, but it will be impossible to give an exact date for the reply as several units have to be consulted and the final reply has to be approved by the hierarchy.
We hope to be able to send you a reply soon and apologize for the delay.

Best regards,
DG TRADE

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Dear Madams & Sirs,

this is to inform you that I have just sent the below confirmatory application on the request GESTDEM 2015/3854.

Yours faithfully,

Cecilia Olivet
------------------------------------
Alexander Italianer
Secretary-General
European Commission
Rue de la Loi 200
B-1049 Brussels
Belgium

By email: [email address]

Amsterdam, January 20th 2016

Confirmatory application in relation to access to information request (GESTDEM 2015/3854)

Dear Sir,

On 20 July 2015, the Transnational Institute (TNI) requested access, on the basis of Regulation 1049/2001 and the Code of Good Administrative Behaviour, to a list of meetings of DG Trade officials and representatives of international arbitral institutions in which the EU's foreign investment policy, and in particular Investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) was discussed, via the online portal asktheeu.org.

On 22 July 2015, DG Trade of the European Commission acknowledged receipt of TNI’s application and confirmed that it would be dealt within 15 working days.

On 12 August 2015, DG Trade requested an extension of the time limit for 2 September 2015. On 1 September, DG Trade requested a new extension until 30 September, which TNI gladly accepted.

After that date, DG Trade sent messages in October and December where each time they promised a prompt reply to the request.

On 17 December 2015, TNI sent a message to the Commission, pointing out that notwithstanding the expiration of all the time limits set by Regulation 1049/2001, the European Commission had neither granted access to the requested documents nor had it written to TNI denying total or partial access thereto. TNI then gave the Commission until 31 December 2015 to reply to its initial application.

The last message from DG Trade from 20 January failed to give any indication on the status of the request and a possible date for the release of the documents.

The whole communication from asktheeu.org can be access from http://www.asktheeu.org/en/request/dg_tr...

Six months have passed since the request was initiated, therefore the initial application must be deemed to have been refused. According to Article 7(4) of Regulation 1049/2001, TNI is thus entitled to make a confirmatory application.

TNI respectfully requests you:
1. to carry out an internal review of DG Trade's handling of my FOI request 'DG Trade and international arbitral institutions: information on meetings and correspondence' (GESTDEM 2015/3854).
1. to declare the refusal decision invalid on the grounds that the documents requested have been withheld without reason and beyond all statutory deadlines, thereby infringing Regulation 1049/2001 and EC law in general, and
2. to forward the documents requested.

Yours sincerely,

Cecilia Olivet
Transnational Institute

4 Attachments

Dear Ms Olivet,

 

Please find enclosed our reply to your request for access to documents
under Regulation 1049/2001.

 

This letter will also be sent to you by registered mail.

 

Kind regards,

 
European Commission
DG TRADE