European Court of Justice: Member States must ensure legal recognition of gender

On 12 March 2026, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) delivered a landmark judgment. According to the judgment, Member States are obliged to issue documents reflecting the gender they experience to their citizens exercising their right to free movement. This judgment is of great importance for trans people who face systematic obstacles to obtaining documents.

On 12 March 2026, the CJEU delivered its judgment in Case C-43/24 Shipova. The case was brought by a Bulgarian trans woman, currently living in Italy, who had been denied gender and name recognition by Bulgarian courts for almost a decade. The Court ruled that Member States are obliged to provide a legal recognition of gender (HCT) procedure for their citizens exercising their right to free movement. The judgment is directly binding on three Member States, Bulgaria, Hungary and Slovakia, which have completely banned legal recognition of gender.

The court's ruling clearly acknowledges the role that documentation plays in the daily lives of trans people. The ECtHR noted that the discrepancy between the gender they experience and their official documents often forces trans people to repeatedly explain their identity at airports, hospitals, workplaces, educational institutions and border crossings. The court described this situation as "significant concerns".

The Court’s statement that “tolerating discrimination based on the difference between biological sex and gender identity” violates the dignity and freedom of trans people is of particular importance. This is one of the first cases in which the ECtHR has explicitly recognised trans identity as a ground for protection against discrimination in itself. Furthermore, the Court has declared that national supreme courts’ bans on legal gender recognition are incompatible with EU law. 

Two cases against Bulgaria were won at the European Court of Human Rights in 2020 and 2022 for failing to provide procedures for legal gender recognition. However, in 2023, the Bulgarian Supreme Court issued a decision effectively prohibiting the changing of gender records for trans people. The ECtHR’s ruling in this case considered that ban to be directly contrary to EU law. Hungary banned legal gender recognition by law in 2020 and Slovakia in 2025. The European Commission has based this decision on the may initiate infringement procedures.

Powered by Froala Editor