The Constitutional Court of Slovakia has ruled that the mandatory security clearances for judges that were introduced in 2014 are unconstitutional. The Fico government added a provision to the Constitution requiring clearances for judges through the National Security Authority (NBÚ). The ruling states that the law contradicts the “implicit material core of the Constitution of the Slovak Republic” stemming from the principles of democracy, rule of law and the principle of power distribution linked to the independence of the judiciary.