Germany: Government Curbing Freedom of Information Act

Click to expand Image Graffiti on a wooden fence in front of the Reichstag building in Berlin, Germany reads "Freedom," on May 19, 2025. © 2025 JOHN MACDOUGALL/AFP via Getty Images (Berlin, July 8, 2026) – The German government should abandon its plans to gut Germany’s Freedom of Information Act, Human Rights Watch said today. The proposed amendments will threaten core human rights essential to transparency and public participation in a democracy based on the rule of law. On July 2, 2026, the co