Germany
Informationsfreiheitsgesetz
IFG v. 5.9.2005 (BGBl. I S. 2722)
Germany's federal access law. The Bundeswehr's military-security remit is a named exemption (§ 3 Nr. 1b), which shapes what the BMVg will release.
The clock
30 calendar days
Access 'without delay' and within one month; a rejection must also issue within the month.
The BMVg has said in Bundestag answers that it does not systematically record UAP sightings — the parliamentary answers themselves are the productive records, and they are already public.
Reading the statute itself
The text of this one is not reproduced here: foreign legislation is published under its own country’s copyright rules, so it is linked instead. Everything on this page — the deadline, the appeal path, the fee standard — is Aletheca’s summary of that text, and the official source is one click away.
If they refuse
- Appeal deadline
- 30 days — one month to lodge a Widerspruch (administrative objection)
- Appeal route
- Widerspruch to the ministry within a month, then the Verwaltungsgericht; the Federal Commissioner (BfDI) can mediate at any point.
- Litigation
- Verwaltungsgericht (administrative court), once the objection is decided.
Fees and expedition
Fee-waiver standard
Fees up to €500 by schedule; simple requests are free. Ask for the fee estimate before consenting to processing.
Aletheca argues this on every request it files here. A service that publishes every page it receives, free, to a public archive has an unusually strong showing — considerably stronger than a private requester’s.
Exemptions it allows
- §3 Besondere öffentliche Belange (incl. military security)
- §5 Personal data
- §6 Trade and business secrets
Quirks worth knowing
Many German requests are filed in public through the unofficial FragDenStaat platform, which is not a government service and is not required.