Recurrent: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation

Resolution appealed: R CTBG 0405/2025

In exercise of the right of access to public information, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation was requested to provide a scanned copy, based on the original, of the respective instruments of ratification that have been the subject of an exchange of the Treaty of Friendship, Good-Neighbourliness and Cooperation between the Kingdom of Spain and the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, signed in Madrid on 24 July 2008.

The Ministry responds by providing the link Official State Gazette No. 263 of October 31, 2024, where it says it has been published.

The claimant states that he has not been provided with the request since, although the Instrument of Ratification by the Kingdom of Spain was published, nothing is said about the Instrument of Ratification by the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, a document which must be kept by the Ministry. The scanned documents of the original, as requested, are also not provided.

The Council partially estimates the claim. It considers that the Ministry has not denied that the information relating to the Instrument of Ratification of the Islamic Republic of Mauritania is in its possession; nor has it alleged that any legal cause (of those provided for in articles 14 and 18 LTAIBG) exists to justify the non-delivery of the said document, and it is therefore appropriate to consider the claim in respect thereof. With regard to the Spanish Instrument of Ratification, it considers that access to information has been facilitated in accordance with the provisions of Article 22.3 LTAIBG.