EU court reprimands von der Leyen: Pfizergate SMS could be discovered!

EU court reprimands von der Leyen: Pfizergate SMS could be discovered!

The EU court has made a ruling in the “Pfizergate” case, which focuses on Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, and Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla. The lively text message exchange between the two, which took place as part of billion-dollar vaccine deals, raises many questions. Loud faz.net The court ignored key aspects, such as a possible order for the corona vaccine via SMS or whether the EU may have paid too much for the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines.

In its ruling, the court found that the EU Commission had unlawfully withheld information. The justifications for refusing to share information were deemed flimsy. This has significant implications for how the head of the Commission handles relevant information.

Transparency demands and legal consequences

The New York Times initiated legal action based on a corresponding request for the release of information and was successful in the court of the European Union. The judges stated that the EU Commission could not conclusively explain why the SMS should not be published. This shows that the public has a right of access to documents, which is a positive signal for the transparency of the EU institutions, according to investigative journalist Alexander Fanta, who also calls for access to the SMS in order to be able to understand possible price increases per dose.

The EU Commission had argued that the text messages were “short-lived and irrelevant” and refused to release them. However, Fanta fears that this could establish a general exception for SMS and instant messages in the EU. The court made it clear that in this case the withholding of information was not justified, showing that there may have been political errors, but not demonstrable violations of the law.

Consequences of the judgment

The ruling has far-reaching consequences for Ursula von der Leyen and the EU Commission's handling of important information. The contents of the SMS remain unclear, and it is questionable whether the public will ever have access to them. The EU Commission is currently planning to examine this ruling and provide a more detailed justification for its previous decisions, which is likely to further fuel the discussion about transparency and citizens' rights within the Union.