João Pedro Sousa (master’s student in European Union Law at the School of Law of the University of Minho)

The role of transparency in EU Law

Transparency within the European Union’s constitutional order is not a matter of institutional courtesy or political goodwill: it is a binding legal obligation anchored in the Treaties and the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (CFREU). The EU’s legitimacy as a supranational legal order is not derived solely from formal democratic representation, but from its ability to guarantee open governance, accountability, and legal certainty. These principles converge in the citizen’s right of access to documents, which is both a general principle of EU law and a fundamental right under Article 42 CFREU.^[1] Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 operationalises this right, setting the legal framework for public access to the documents of the EU institutions.^[2] Article 11(2) TEU, which mandates the Union institutions to maintain an open, transparent, and regular dialogue with civil society, reinforces the legal architecture of transparency, a requirement that becomes especially salient when decisions involve significant public expenditure and health policy.

Against this normative backdrop, the judgment delivered by the General Court (GC) in Case T‑36/23 on 14 May 2025,[3] publicly referred to as “Pfizergate”, emerged as a pivotal episode in the evolution of EU transparency law. ^[4] The dispute was triggered by a request submitted by journalist Matina Stevi of The New York Times, seeking access to text messages allegedly exchanged between the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and Albert Bourla, CEO of Pfizer.^[5] The messages were reportedly exchanged during negotiations that led to a contract for the procurement of 1.8 billion doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID‑19 vaccine, amounting to approximately €35 billion in public expenditure, plus an additional €2.4 billion in related contracts. The Commission’s refusal to grant access to these communications, on the grounds that they were not in its possession, raised fundamental questions about the scope of transparency obligations and the nature of institutional accountability during states of emergency. ^[6]

Gonçalo Martins de Matos (Master in Judiciary Law by the University of Minho | Member of the Editorial Support of this blog)

There is a very relevant case regarding the defence of fundamental rights being processed at the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU): an infringement procedure moved against Hungary by the European Commission on the grounds of breaching Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union (TEU). It is a relevant case because it is the first case to frame abuses of fundamental rights by Hungarian authorities as an overarching systemic problem, instead of the usual sectorial and solitary breaches. This case might open up the infringement procedure to a valuable role of a fundamental rights protection mechanism,[1] as it has been defended by legal scholars and practitioners. And that role is very important in the context of rule of law backsliding and recent democratic erosion.

Fundamental rights are of elementary importance in the European Union (EU)’s legal order. As a matter of fact, the EU is axiologically based on a set of values ​​common to its Member States, namely respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights, enshrined in Article 2 TEU and self-imposed as an objective of the Union itself, according to Article 3(1) TEU. It is this conception of the EU as a community of values ​​that contributes to the construction of the “society in which pluralism, non-discrimination, tolerance, justice, solidarity and equality between women and men prevail” referred to in the second part of Article 2 TEU. More than a community of values, the EU creates law to which its legal and institutional framework, its Member States and its citizens are bound, resulting in the notion that the Union submits to the principles that itself created. From this notion we conclude that the EU conceives itself as a Union subjected to the Law, in which the exercise of European public power is linked to EU law. We are in presence of the principle of the rule of law translated into the logic of the EU: the principle of the Union of Law, which functions as a limit to the actions of European institutions and a guarantee of the rights of individuals attributed by European provisions.

João Pedro Sousa (master’s student in European Union Law at the School of Law of the University of Minho)

1. Introduction

Protecting personal data is a cornerstone of the European Union (EU) legal framework, safeguarded by Article 8 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (CFREU) and Article 16 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), especially since the entry into force of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). This regulation aims to ensure citizens’ privacy and establish clear standards for using personal data by both public and private entities.[1] However, international data transfer became particularly prominent, specifically after the Schrems II case exposed vulnerabilities in transatlantic data protection relations and the consequent annulment of the Privacy Shield by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU).[2]

The judgment in case T-354/22, of January 8, 2025, known as Bindl v. Commission, delivered by the General Court (GC),[3] represents a milestone in strengthening the guarantees provided by the GDPR. For the first time, the European Commission was ordered to pay compensation for moral damages resulting from infringing stringent data protection laws.[4] This case, initiated by an EU citizen, concerns the improper transfer of personal data of users of the Conference on the Future of Europe (CFE) website to the United States (US), in violation of the regulation.[5]