15/04/2025 (Agence Europe) – In a letter addressed to European Commissioner for Transparency Maroš Šefčovič on Tuesday, 15 April, nearly one hundred journalists covering European affairs for general and specialist media (MLex, EUobserver, Agence Europe, Contexte, Euractiv, Investigate Europe) have complained about the “systemic” slowness with which the European Commission handles access-to-documents requests. Based on statistics from the European Ombudsman, they note that in more than 60% of cases, responses to requests exceed the two-week deadline set out in Regulation 1049/2001 governing access to the EU institutions’ documents. They also criticise the European Commission for its excessively broad use of the exceptions provided for in this regulation without providing concrete evidence that the publication of the required documents would harm stakeholders’ interests. See the letter: https://aeur.eu/f/gge (MB)