Afghanistan

Name of law: Access to Information Law
First adopted: 2014
Last modified: 2019-10
RTI Rating last updated: 2020-01

Introduction

Afghanistan’s constitutional and legislative right to information protections are among the strongest in the world. Adopted in 2018, the Afghani RTI Law builds on a constitutional protection for the right to information, introducing strong and robust procedural safeguards. The legislation is exceptionally broad in scope regarding requestors, public authorities, and information, with limited exceptions in line with international standards. Possible areas for further improvement would be to ensure the complete independence, including in budgetary terms, of the Access to Information Commission and the creation of a system of redress vis-à-vis public authorities which fail systematically in their statutory duties to disclose requested information. Regardless, the Afghan law lies at the forefront of right to information legislation internationally. The original Dari version of the law is available here.