Greek court ruling clouds old ID passports

The news in Greek

1. αστυνομικός
   που έχει σχέση με την αστυνομία ή ανήκει στην αστυνομία ↩︎
2. δελτίο  (n.)
   έγγραφο ή έντυπο με επίσημες πληροφορίες ή στοιχεία ↩︎
3. ανανεώνω
   να ξανακάνω κάτι καινούργιο ή έγκυρο για μεγαλύτερο χρονικό διάστημα ↩︎
4. δικαστήριο  (n.)
   θεσμός ή χώρος όπου δικαστές εξετάζουν υποθέσεις και βγάζουν αποφάσεις σύμφωνα με τον νόμο ↩︎
5. υπόθεση  (f.)
   συγκεκριμένο θέμα που εξετάζεται, ειδικά από δικαστήριο ή αρχή ↩︎
6. νομικός
   που έχει σχέση με τον νόμο ή το δίκαιο ↩︎

Translation

Text comprehension

Question 1: What did the citizen want to do using his old 1972 identity card?

Question 2: Did the court finally give a clear decision about the legal issue of old identity cards?

Vocabulary

Greek	English
αστυνομικός	police
δελτίο  (n.)	card / certificate / bulletin (depending on context)
ανανεώνω	renew / extend
δικαστήριο  (n.)	court
υπόθεση  (f.)	case / matter
νομικός	legal / juridical

Read the full story

The Council of State, Greece’s highest administrative court, has issued decisions that have created uncertainty over whether Greek citizens can renew or obtain passports using old-style police identity cards. The case has drawn attention because many Greeks still hold identity documents issued decades ago, while the authorities are in the process of moving towards newer formats.

The dispute began when a citizen asked the Passport Directorate of the Hellenic Police to renew his passport. He submitted his police identity card, which had been issued in May 1972. The application was refused. The police authorities argued that more than 15 years had passed since the ID card was issued, making it, in their view, impossible to verify that the person in front of them was the same as the person in the old photograph. They told the applicant that he would have to replace his old ID card with a new one before a passport could be issued.

The citizen first appealed to the competent police department, but his appeal was also rejected. He then turned to the Council of State, asking for the police decision to be suspended. He argued that the refusal to renew his passport was not properly justified and that it would cause him serious harm, because he needed to travel abroad for personal reasons and for matters related to his wife’s health.

At the end of December 2025, the Suspensions Committee of the Council of State issued decision 240/2025 in his favour. As a temporary measure, and until the main case could be heard, the court ordered the Hellenic Police to take into account the old-style identity card when examining his passport application. The committee relied on earlier case law, including decision 1602/2021, which had stated that even after the 15‑year period, a police identity card is still considered legally valid until it is actually replaced.

In that decision, the court also underlined that, before issuing a passport, the authorities must check only whether the documents required by law have been submitted, including a valid identity card. According to this view, as long as there is no serious doubt about the authenticity of the ID document, the administrative services are not authorised to carry out a separate, detailed identity comparison based on the person’s appearance. The committee also noted that the police had not mentioned any reasons of public interest to justify refusing the passport, and found that the refusal could cause significant, hard-to-repair damage to the applicant’s family life.

This interim ruling was widely interpreted as putting a stop to the routine practice of rejecting passport applications purely because the applicant had an old-format identity card with an outdated photograph. Some reports presented it as a clear setback for the police’s existing policy and as guidance for future administrative practice.

However, the situation changed when the main case reached a full hearing. On 30 January 2026, the Fourth Chamber of the Council of State delivered its final decision, numbered 64/2026. In this ruling, the judges rejected the citizen’s main application for annulment of the police decision. The rejection was made on procedural grounds: in particular, the citizen was not represented by a lawyer at the hearing. Because the application was dismissed on these technical issues, the court did not examine the substance of the legal dispute in that final decision.

As a direct consequence, the earlier interim decision that had ordered the police to accept the old-style identity card as a temporary measure ceased to be in force. The Council of State itself announced that, with the publication of decision 64/2026, the suspension order contained in decision 240/2025 no longer applied. This meant that the temporary permission to use old-style IDs for this citizen’s passport renewal was cancelled along with his main claim.

Different Greek media outlets have highlighted different aspects of these developments. Some reports stressed the original position of the Suspensions Committee that an old identity card remains valid until replaced and that the police should not automatically reject it, implying a correction to the police’s earlier approach. Other coverage focused on the final outcome, underlining that, after the procedural dismissal on 30 January 2026, the temporary authorisation expired and there is no active court order currently forcing the police to accept old-style identity cards in similar cases.

Because the final judgment was based on formal and procedural reasons, and not on a detailed review of the legal questions, some of the underlying issues remain legally open. These include how long old identity cards should be accepted for passport procedures, what weight should be given to photo differences over time, and how far administrative services may go in checking the physical identity of applicants.

For Greek citizens and observers abroad, the combined effect of the decisions is complex. The 2025 interim ruling signalled that old-style identity cards can, in principle, still be treated as valid supporting documents until officially replaced, and that the authorities should focus on authenticity and legal requirements rather than appearance alone. But the 2026 ruling, by cancelling the interim measure for procedural reasons, means there is currently no clear, final and universally applicable judicial answer on the matter.

In practice, the case shows how administrative rules, citizens’ rights and court procedures interact in Greece. It also illustrates that the final outcome of a legal dispute may depend not only on the substantive law but also on whether all procedural steps, such as legal representation, are correctly followed.

Info: ‘Greek Learner News’ is a service from ‘Let’s Learn Greek’, a language school dedicated to teaching Greek through structured online Greek courses. Through this service, we share updates and information relevant to learners enrolled in our classes.