The Government has been told it can keep secret the documents linked to the proposed inquest into the death of former KGB spy Alexander Litvinenko.
Foreign Secretary William Hague had wanted to overturn coroner Sir Robert Owen's decision to reveal the documents which, the coroner said, were necessary if the inquest was to be "fair and meaningful".
Sir Robert had partly agreed to Mr Hague's request for secrecy in relation to the role of the Russian state and whether the UK could have done anything to prevent the death.
But the coroner refused to exclude all of the public interest immunity (PII) certificate signed by Mr Hague.
Mrs Litvinenko said she was "disappointed but not surprised" Government lawyers contended the documents were "sensitive to the highest degree" and public disclosure would damage the national interest.
At London's High Court Lord Justice Goldring, sitting with two other judges, has declared the material must remain secret.
Quashing the coroner's decision to reveal it, the judge said: "I am driven to the conclusion that the weight the coroner gave to the views of the Secretary of State was insufficient and amounted to an error of law."
The judge, sitting with Lord Justice Treacy and Mr Justice Mitting, said the issues raised by the case "concerned the risk of significant damage to national security" and added: "Nothing we have decided reduces the importance of open justice."
The coroner is considering whether to appeal.
Mr Litvinenko, 43, a Russian dissident and former KGB agent, was poisoned in 2006 by radioactive polonium-210 while drinking tea during a meeting with former security colleagues at the Millennium Hotel in London's Grosvenor Square.
He died three weeks later.
His death raised questions over whether the Russian state was involved, as alleged by Mr Litvinenko's widow Marina and his son Anatoly.
Mrs Litvinenko said through her QC she was "disappointed but not surprised" by today's ruling and she was "gathering her strength" for what might be her last attempt "to see the truth emerge about the Russian state's responsibility" for her husband's death.
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