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Zitnanska: Court Rulings That Could Harm Children Won't Be Published
Tuesday 28 December 2010 Zoom in | Print page
Bratislava, December 28 (TASR) - Even if President Ivan Gasparovic's veto of an amendment to the Judges and Judicial Assistants Act is broken in Parliament, the provision vis-a-vis making court rulings public on the web as of 2012 won't apply in all cases, Justice Minister Lucia Zitnanska told TASR on Tuesday.
"The rule is that if court proceedings aren't public, then court decisions or access to them may be limited," she said, adding that the Cabinet will introduce a specific rule whereby it won't be obligatory to publish certain types of court rulings on the internet. This will apply in particular to court decisions that may affect the personal rights of children.
Likewise, court rulings involving trade secrets or confidential information won't be released, either, she said.
The legislation in question has provoked heavy criticism from former justice minister and current Supreme Court Chairman Stefan Harabin, who said on Monday that he finds it "perverted to release court rulings concerning alimony, divorce or the rape of a child." According to Harabin, the obligation of courts to go public with their decisions shouldn't apply to past rulings. In addition, clear-cut criteria in this respect must be instituted in order to prevent the rights of children and crime victims being infringed.
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