The Relevance of the Aarhus Convention to the Concept of Access to Legal Information
The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters (Aarhus Convention) is relevant to the concept of access to legal information because public legal information is included in its definition of “environmental information. Section 2(3) of the Aarhus Convention states:
“3. ‘Environmental information’ means any information in written, visual, aural, electronic or any other material form on:
(a) The state of elements of the environment, such as air and atmosphere, water, soil, land, landscape and natural sites, biological diversity and its components, including genetically modified organisms, and the interaction among these elements;
(b) Factors, such as substances, energy, noise and radiation, and activities or measures, including administrative measures, environmental agreements, policies, legislation, plans and programmes, affecting or likely to affect the elements of the environment within the scope of subparagraph (a) above, and cost-benefit and other economic analyses and assumptions used in environmental decision-making;
(c) The state of human health and safety, conditions of human life, cultural sites and built structures, inasmuch as they are or may be affected the state of the elements of the environment or, through these elements, the factors, activities or measures referred to in subparagraph (b) above . . .”
The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe introduces the Aarhus Convention as follows:
“The UNECE Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters was adopted on 25th June 1998 in the Danish city of Aarhus at the Fourth Ministerial Conference in the ‘Environment for Europe’ process.
Together with its Protocol on Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers, it protects every person’s right to live in an environment adequate to his or her health and well-being. They are the only global legally binding global instruments on environmental democracy that put Principle 10 of the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development in practice. . . .”
Dr. Leesi Ebenezer Mitee is the Founder and Director of the Human Right of Free Access to Law Advocacy (HURIFALA). He holds a multidisciplinary PhD in international human rights law, legal information technology (legal informatics), indigenous customary law and indigenous rights.
He is an Associate Professor of Law and a former legal research national consultant to the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) on the 1998 PCASED project that provided the juridical foundations for the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) 1998 Moratorium which culminated in a regional multilateral treaty: ECOWAS Convention on Small Arms and Light Weapons, their Ammunition and other Related Matters 2006.
Dr. Mitee’s legal innovations include:
➤ pioneered the global advocacy of the recognition of the right of free access to public legal information as a substantive human right in 2017;
➤ devised the <.officiallaws) official public legal information generic top-level domain (gTLD) system for easy identification of the reliable versions of the laws published online worldwide;
➤ developed the system of nationally networked one-stop official public legal information websites (NOPLIW system) for optimal findability and management of online law databases;
➤ invented the human rights-based public access-adequate huricompatisation model of ascertainment of indigenous customary law; and
➤ formulated the new human rights-advocacy approach (NHRAA) that consists of ten criteria for the recognition of new human rights.
His upcoming New Human Right of Free Access to Public Legal Information Book Series consists of 22 modern academic article-style independent but interconnected chapters of four books:
➤ Developments in Human Rights Law and the New Human Right of Free Access to Public Legal Information: The New Human Rights-Advocacy Approach and the Ten Criteria for the Formal Recognition of New Human Rights (Volume 1) — ISBN 9789083108520 (eBook) 9789083108506 (paperback);
➤ The New Human Rights-Based Huricompatisation Model of Ascertainment of Indigenous Customary Law: Strategies for Adequate Local and Global Public Access (Volume 2) — ISBN 9789083108568 (eBook) 9789083108544 (paperback);
➤ Innovative Technological Mechanisms for Adequate Web-Based Access to National and Global Public Legal Information (Volume 3) — ISBN 9789083108513 (eBook) 9789083108582 (paperback); and
➤ A Model Empirical Study of the Current State of Governmental Provision of Free Access to Nigerian Public Legal Information (Volume 4) — ISBN 9789083108551 (eBook) 9789083108537 (paperback).
Email: info@hurifala.org
Website: https://hurifala.org