CEDH · CASELAW;COMMUNICATEDCASES;ENG — 4 décembre 2025

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .s379BC09C { margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:right } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .s5E1364CA { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .s339D85E6 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s665E407E { margin-top:66pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .s10950C61 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-indent:14.2pt; text-align:justify } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } Published on 22 December 2025   FIFTH SECTION Application no. 54881/19 Doina CIOBANU against the Republic of Moldova lodged on 10 October 2019 communicated on 4 December 2025 STATEMENT OF FACTS The application concerns the judicial review proceedings of the applicant’s dismissal, following a classified decision to refuse to renew her security clearance for access to State secrets on two grounds, the reasons for which were not disclosed nor subjected to the courts’ review. Having a security clearance was a prerequisite to hold the post with the Ministry of Interior. The applicant complains under Article 6 of the Convention. On 25 August 2014 the applicant started working at the Ministry of Interior and was later granted security clearance. On 31 January 2015 she was transferred to another position. However on 19 August 2015 the Security and Information Service informed the Ministry of Interior about the refusal to grant the applicant the required security clearance on two grounds provided by law: that she posed a threat to national security and that she submitted inaccurate information on her clearance form. On 28 September 2015 the applicant was dismissed from her position with the Ministry of Interior for absence of the security clearance required for her post. The applicant appealed against her dismissal and sought in court the presentation of the decision refusing her the security clearance with its reasons. On 19 January 2016 the first-instance court ordered the Security and Information Service to provide all documents related to the applicant’s clearance status, including those classified. It appears that this order was not enforced. On 23 May 2016 the Chișinău Centru District Court dismissed the applicant’s request concluding that the applicant had failed to properly communicate about her marital status on the clearance form when she had written “not married” while in fact she had been living together with her partner. The court did not call into question the grounds for the decision of the Security and Information Service to refuse security clearance. The applicant appealed against the first-instance judgment noting that the domestic law allowed for the correction of inaccuracies, although the information was accurate because she was not married, and that the reasons why she was considered to pose a threat to national security had never been disclosed. After two rehearings, on 10 April 2019 the Supreme Court of Justice finally upheld the judgment of the first instance and the decision for the applicant’s dismissal. The applicant complains under Article 6 of the Convention about the domestic courts’ reliance on the decision to refuse her security clearance although that decision remained undisclosed both to the applicant and the courts. QUESTION TO THE PARTIES Did the applicant have access to a court with full jurisdiction and were the judicial review proceedings in respect of her dismissal fair, as required by Article 6 § 1 of the Convention? Did the reliance by the domestic courts on the decision to refuse the applicant’s access to classified information, without examining its validity, put disproportionate restrictions on the applicant’s right to access to court under Article 6 ( Regner v. the Czech Republic [GC], no. 35289/11, §§ 146-162, 19 September 2017; and   Aleksandar Sabev v.   Bulgaria , no.   43503/08, 19 July 2018)?