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The Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic requested an interpretation of EU law from the Court of Justice of the European Union, which it deemed necessary in two cassation proceedings. In Case No. 7Svk/34/2025, by a resolution dated April 8, 2026, it requested an interpretation of Article 22 of the Rules of Procedure of the Court of Justice of the European Union, and in Case No. 7Svk/15/2026, by a resolution dated July 22, 2026, it requested an interpretation of Article 9(3) and (4) of the Aarhus Convention in conjunction with Article 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. 

In Case No. 7Svk/34/2025, the applicant requested that the Ministry of Justice of the Slovak Republic (hereinafter “the Ministry of Justice”) provide him, pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act, with access to the written comments – statements submitted by the parties in the proceedings before the Court of Justice of the European Union (Case No. C-203/20). The Ministry of Justice disclosed some of these comments but refused to provide the applicant with the comments of the European Commission and those of the individuals who participated in the proceedings before the CJEU. It justified this refusal, among other things, by stating that these comments were addressed to the CJEU, while the Ministry of Justice had merely been informed of them. It was therefore not the author of those comments, and the Freedom of Information Act cannot have extraterritorial effect with respect to other entities. The Administrative Court essentially concurred with this assessment, and the applicant therefore filed a cassation complaint against its judgment. 

The Supreme Administrative Court considered it important that the disclosure of copies of files from the Court of Justice of the European Union is governed by Article 22 of its Rules of Procedure, which may also be the subject of a preliminary ruling under Article 267(1) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. In the opinion of the Supreme Administrative Court, the aforementioned provision (Article 22 of the Rules of Procedure of the CJEU) can be interpreted in two ways: either as binding only on the CJEU itself, but not precluding Slovak law from requiring the Ministry of Justice to make submissions sent to it by the CJEU to other persons; or as a general provision at the EU law level governing the handling of the contents of CJEU case files, which precludes the Slovak legislature from regulating the disclosure of such documents differently. 

Therefore, he decided to submit this question to the CJEU: 

“Does Article 22(2) of the Rules of Procedure of the CJEU (…), read in conjunction with the sixth paragraph of Article 253 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union and Article 63 and the second paragraph of Article 64 of Protocol No 3 on the Statute of the CJEU, preclude an interpretation of national law under which an authority of a Member State is required to make available to third parties (to anyone) a document submitted to the CJEU in the context of the written part of the procedure by a party other than that Member State, which document was served on that Member State by the CJEU in the performance of its duties under the second paragraph of Article 20 of Protocol No 3 on the Statute of the CJEU?” 

The decision was adopted unanimously by Panel 7S of the Supreme Administrative Court, composed of: President of the Panel JUDr. Jana Martinčeková and Members of the Panel Mgr. Michal Novotný and JUDr. Eva Vékonyová. The proceedings are pending before the CJEU under Case No. C-456/26. 

In Case No. 7Svk/15/2026, a civic association whose purpose is forest conservation requested access to decisions by the Ministry of the Environment of the Slovak Republic (hereinafter referred to as the “Ministry of the Environment”) granting so-called species protection exemptions (also known as “hunting permits”) for brown bears. The Ministry of the Environment issued these decisions at a time when the government had declared a state of emergency specifically in connection with the undesirable presence of brown bears. Based on this request, on July 31, 2025, the association also obtained a decision that the Ministry of the Environment had issued on April 10, 2025. On September 30, 2025, the association filed an administrative lawsuit against it, but the administrative court dismissed it as out of time. The Administrative Court Code (§ 181(3)) requires that the public concerned file a complaint no later than two months after the decision becomes final. According to the administrative court, this deadline had already expired on June 10, 2025. 

The Supreme Administrative Court had doubts, above all, as to whether the applicant association constituted the public concerned, since Slovak law—with the exception of Article 2, paragraphs 4 and 5, of the Aarhus Convention—lacks a general definition of the public concerned. Although the Administrative Court Code (Section 42(1)) allows the public concerned to file a lawsuit against a decision by, for example, a ministry, this is permitted only on the condition that the public concerned had the right to participate in the administrative proceedings before the ministry. However, due to very specific legal provisions, civic associations engaged in environmental protection did not have the right to participate in proceedings in which the Ministry of the Environment decided on the shooting of a bear during an emergency situation. Consequently, they did not meet the condition set out in the Administrative Court Code. The Supreme Administrative Court expressed doubts as to whether such legal provisions comply with the requirements of Article 9(3) of the Aarhus Convention and Article 47 of the Charter, as interpreted by the case law of the CJEU. 

Furthermore, the Supreme Administrative Court recognized that EU law does not preclude the establishment of time limits for filing administrative actions; however, such provisions must satisfy the so-called “requirement of effectiveness.” This means that they must not be formulated in a way that renders the exercise of rights recognized by EU law impossible or unduly difficult. Section 181(3) of the Administrative Court Code provides that the public concerned must always file an administrative action within two months of the decision becoming final. Even determining the exact moment when the Ministry of the Environment’s decision of April 10, 2025, became final was difficult for the plaintiff, as this decision was not issued in accordance with the Administrative Procedure Code, which clearly defines this moment (in Section 51(1)). Furthermore, the applicant did not even have the right to participate in these proceedings and first learned of the decision on July 31, 2025—that is, at a time when the two-month deadline for challenging it had long since expired (June 10, 2025). Under these circumstances, the Supreme Administrative Court had doubts as to whether such a provision was inconsistent with the requirements of Article 9(3) and (4) of the Aarhus Convention, in conjunction with Article 47 of the Charter. 

On that basis, he decided to submit two questions to the CJEU: 

1. “Are Article 9(3) of the Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-Making, and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters (… referred to as the Aarhus Convention), read in conjunction with the first paragraph of Article 47 of the Charter, to be interpreted as that they preclude national legislation, such as the provision of Section 42 of the Administrative Court Code, which grants the public concerned the right to bring an administrative action (against a decision of a public authority) only if it had “the right to participate in administrative proceedings under a specific regulation,” even though the national legislation (…) expressly excludes, under the specific circumstances applicable in the present case, the participation of the public concerned in administrative proceedings in which a decision is made regarding authorization to kill a brown bear (Ursus arctos)?
2. If the answer to the first question is in the affirmative: Should Article 9(4) of the Aarhus Convention—in particular, the requirement that the procedure referred to in Article 9(3) ensure an adequate and effective remedy and must be fair, equitable, and timely—even when read in conjunction with Article 47(1) of the Charter, be interpreted as precluding national provisions such as those in § 181(3) and (4) of the Administrative Court Code, under which the public concerned must file an administrative action to challenge the decision to cull described in the first question, within a time limit that is always two months from the date the decision becomes final, and failure to meet that time limit can never be excused, even though national law does not allow the public concerned to participate in the proceedings in which that decision was issued, the date on which the decision becomes final does not depend on when the public concerned learned of the decision, and that date cannot be unequivocally determined? ” 

The decision was adopted unanimously by Panel 7S of the Supreme Administrative Court, composed of: President of the Panel Mgr. Michal Novotný and Members of the Panel JUDr. Jana Martinčeková and JUDr. Eva Vékonyová. The proceedings are pending before the CJEU under Case No. C-855/26.