Judgment_paragraph 29 · Ciarán Toland v European Parliament (T-471/08)

29Furthermore, the examination required for the processing of a request for access to documents must be specific in nature. First, the mere fact that a document concerns an interest protected by an exception is not of itself sufficient to justify application of that exception (see, by analogy, Case T-20/99 Denkavit Nederland v Commission [2000] ECR II-3011, paragraph 45). In principle, such an application can be justified only if the institution has previously determined, first, that access to the document would specifically and actually undermine the protected interest and, secondly, in the circumstances referred to in Article 4(2) and (3) of Regulation No 1049/2001, that there is no overriding public interest justifying disclosure of the document concerned (see, to that effect, Joined Cases T-355/04 and T-446/04 Co-Frutta v Commission [2010] ECR II-1, paragraph 123). Second, the risk of the protected interest being undermined must be reasonably foreseeable and not purely hypothetical (see, by analogy, Case T-211/00 Kuijer v Council [2002] ECR II-485, paragraph 56). That examination must be apparent from the reasons for the decision (Case T-2/03 Verein für Konsumenteninformation v Commission [2005] ECR II-1121, paragraph 69, and Franchet and Byk v Commission, cited in paragraph 9 above, paragraph 115).