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An extended panel of judges of the Supreme Administrative Court of Lithuania (SACL) is hearing an administrative case in which the applicant appealed against the decision of the Centre of Registers to refuse to register in the Register of Marriage Contracts (the "Register") a marriage contract entered into in the Italian Republic on the matrimonial property regime. The applicant's marriage certificate in Italy also declares the legal regime of the property chosen by the spouses and therefore constitutes the marriage contract which the applicant seeks to have registered in the Register. The refusal to register such a contract was based on the regulation in the Regulations of the Register which provides that a marriage contract concluded in a foreign country may be registered if it contains the personal identification number of at least one of the spouses. The marriage contract submitted by the applicant to the Registry did not comply with that requirement. The applicant applied to the competent authority of the Italian Republic for an extract of the relevant document containing the applicant's personal identification number, but her request was refused.

It should be noted that the applicant's marriage in Italy was registered in the Republic of Lithuania at the civil registry office, despite the fact that the marriage certificate did not contain the spouses' personal codes. However, the absence of a personal identification number precludes, under national legislation, the same document from being registered as a marriage contract establishing the legal regime of the matrimonial property.

In such circumstances, the extended panel of SACL Judges had doubts as to whether the national legislation relevant in the case should not be regarded as a deterrent to citizens of the Union from exercising the freedom of movement conferred on them by Article 21 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU). Accordingly, it was decided to refer the matter to the Court of Justice of the European Union for a preliminary ruling as to whether Article 21(1) TFEU should be interpreted as precluding national legislation under which a marriage contract concluded in another Member State of the European Union may not be registered in the Register of Marriage Contracts, where, in circumstances such as those of the present case, the competent authorities of the Member State in which the contract was concluded refuse to provide an extract of the contract, supplemented by the relevant personal identification data, unless the contract contains the personal identification number of at least one of the contracting parties, as provided for in the population register of the Republic of Lithuania.

Administrative case No. eA-834-662/2023.