A citizen submitted a request for information to the MINISTRY OF ECONOMIC AFFAIRS AND DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION, requesting access to the current debt that Cuba and Venezuela have towards Spain, as well as the renegotiations, debt write-offs and interest and debt restructurings from 2004 to the present time, together with the relevant reports and administrative records.
The Administration refused access due to administrative silence and, at the claim stage, handed over part of the information to the claimant, denying the rest since, in its opinion, the limit of article 14.1.c) applies, relating to external relations.
The Council of Transparency and Good Governance considered the complaint, on the grounds that the configuration of the legal framework for the management of external debt is based, among others, on the principle of transparency conceived as one of the guiding principles of Spanish policy in this matter, which finds concrete projection in the procedure of accountability before the Cortes Generales. To this end, the agreement of the Paris Club of 2015 that forgave 8.5 billion of the 11.1 billion dollars of sovereign debt that Cuba stopped paying in 1986, plus the charges, is public. The invoked limit does not apply.
The Supreme Court has accepted the cassation appeal lodged by the Council of Transparency and Good Government against the ruling of the National High Court that revokes its resolution.
In its order for admission, the Supreme Court has stated that the issue raised in the appeal that has an objective casational interest for the formation of jurisprudence consists in determining whether the limit of Article 14.1(c) of the LTAIBG, relating to external relations, allows to deny access to the content of the minutes in the sessions of the Paris Club for collecting mentions on the reasons why some or other debt forgiveness and agreements affecting the foreign policy of the country are admitted.
