Ref. Ares(2023)26535 - 03/01/2023
EUROPEAN COMMISSION
DIRECTORATE-GENERAL FOR FINANCIAL STABILITY, FINANCIAL SERVICES AND CAPITAL
MARKETS UNION
General Affairs
Policy planning and implementation, inter-institutional relations
Mr Barnaby PACE
Global Witness
Rue Belliard 53
1000 Bruxelles
Belgium
e-mail: ask+request-11991-
xxxxxxxx@xxxxxxxx.xxx
Brussels,
Subject:
Your application for access to documents – Case 2022/5854
Dear Mr Pace,
We refer to your request for access to the European Commission documents registered on
13 October 2022 under the above-mentioned reference number.
You requested access to: “
[a]ll documents—including but not limited to correspondence,
emails, minutes, notes (hand written or electronic), audio or video recordings, verbatim
reports, operational conclusions, lines to take, briefings, and presentations—related to
the meeting on September 21 between Florian Denis and RWE AG, Shell Companies and
ENGIE.”.
We have identified 11 documents that fall in the scope of your request; they are listed in the
attachment.
Please be advised that with regard to all these documents, their full disclosure is prevented
by an exception concerning the protection of privacy and the integrity of individuals
outlined in Article 4(1)(b) of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 because they contain personal
data. Article 9(1)(b) of the Data Protection Regulation1 does not allow the transmission
of these personal data, except if you prove that it is necessary to have the data transmitted
1 Regulation (EU) 2018/1725 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 October 2018 on the
protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data by the Union institutions,
bodies, offices and agencies and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Regulation (EC) No
45/2001 and Decision No 1247/2002/EC, OJ L 295, 21.11.2018, p. 39.
Commission européenne/Europese Commissie, 1049 Bruxelles/Brussel, BELGIQUE/BELGIË - Tel. +32 22991111
to you for a specific purpose in the public interest and where there is no reason to assume
that the legitimate interests of the data subject might be prejudiced.
In your request, you do not express any particular interest to have access to these personal
data nor do you put forward any arguments to establish the necessity to have the data
transmitted for a specific purpose in the public interest. Consequently, we conclude that
pursuant to the combined provision of the Articles and Regulations quoted above, access
cannot be granted to the personal data contained in the requested documents.
The documents 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 8 and 9 originate from a third party. The originators of the
documents have been consulted in accordance with Article 4(4) of Regulation (EC)
No 1049/2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission
documents with a view to assessing whether an exception provided for in Article 4 of this
Regulation is applicable. The originators have agreed to the disclosure of these
documents with the redaction of personal data for the reasons explained above. Please
also note that the documents 3, 8 and 9 can be retrieved at the website of the originator:
https://www.efet.org/home/documents?id=23. The document 11 represents meeting minutes that were drawn up for internal use under
the responsibility of the relevant staff member. The minutes solely reflect the author’s
interpretation of the interventions made and do not set out any official position of the
third parties, to which the documents refer, who were not consulted on their content. The
minutes do not reflect the position of the Commission and cannot be quoted as such.
In case you would disagree with the position expressed in this letter, you are entitled, in
accordance with Article 7(2) of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001, to submit a confirmatory
application requesting the Commission to review its position. Such a confirmatory
application should be addressed to the Secretariat-General of the Commission within 15
working days upon receipt of this letter. You can submit it in one of the following ways:
by asking for a review via your portal2 account (available only for initial requests
submitted via the portal account),
or by mail:
European Commission, Secretariat-General
Transparency, Document Management & Access to Documents (SG.C.1)
BERL 7/076, B-1049 Bruxelles
or by e-mail to: xxxxxxxxxx@xx.xxxxxx.xx
Yours sincerely
Electronically signed
Head of Unit
Attachments: List of identified documents and eight documents (three identified
documents can be retrieved online and hence they are not attached to this letter).
2
https://www.ec.europa.eu/transparency/documents-request
2
Electronically signed on 03/01/2023 12:27 (UTC+01) in accordance with Article 11 of Commission Decision (EU) 2021/2121