On March, 17, the Belgian Parliament finally approved a bill on the protection of journalistic sources. The bill was introduced in June 2003 by Geert Bourgeois, currently Minister of Media in the Flemish Community. It took the Belgian journalists more than 20 years to obtain legal protection of their sources (first law proposals were already introduced in 1985!).

Notwithstanding the broad support given to journalists not to disclose their sources by both the Council of Europe (see, amongst others, Recommendation No. R (2000)7 of the Committee of Ministers on the rights of journalists not to disclose their sources, 8 March 2000) and the European Court of Human Rights (for instance, case of Goodwin v. the UK, 27 March 1996), judicial authorities in Belgium did not hesitate to disrespect the confidentiality of journalistic sources. More than once, journalists were compelled to reveal their information sources or were subject to investigative measures such as searches, seizures and telephone tapping. Journalists unwilling to disclose their sources exposed themselves to criminal punishment.

The legitimacy of such interferences with journalists� freedoms was explicitly recognised by the Belgian Supreme Court (Hof van Cassatie / Court de Cassation). In a recent judgment of December, 1, 2004, this Court still didn�t consider the searches at a journalist�s house and in his office � as part of a legitimate investigation into bribery of a civil servant of the EU � as illegal, nor as a violation of Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights. �Still� refers to the fact that the Supreme Court rendered this decision even after the conviction of Belgium by the European Court of Human Rights for unnecessary and disproportionate interferences by the judicial authorities in another case where the confidentiality of journalistic freedoms was disrespected (case of Ernst and others versus Belgium, 15 July 2003).

Hence, the need for a clear and explicit legal act in order to protect journalistic sources in Belgium. The new law (which still needs to be published in the Official Gazette before entering into force) is based on the principle that the protection of the confidentiality of sources used by journalists is essential to enable journalists to perform their function and to contribute to the maintenance and development of genuine democracy. It formulates a broad notion of who is a journalist (not only professional but also freelance journalists or other people from the editorial staff) and what is protected information. Under the new law the possibility to compel journalists to reveal their sources is substantially reduced: disclosure orders � as well as detection measures and investigative measures � are only in accordance with the law if
1. there are no alternative measures for disclosure and
2. the information possessed by the journalist is crucial to prevent crime that constitutes a serious threat to the physical integrity of one or more persons (including terrorist crimes).
Journalists exercising their right of protection of sources can no longer be prosecuted for fencing (heling / recel), nor for complicity in the crime of breach of professional secrecy.

An (unofficial) English version of the law is available on the website of Prof. Dirk Voorhoof (UGent): http://www.psw.ugent.be/dv/.