The special counsel's team leading the Russia investigation has resisted allowing a foreign state-owned corporation to identify itself amid its ongoing fight over a grand jury subpoena, according to a newly issued order by a Washington federal appeals court that raised questions about the continued broad secrecy surrounding the litigation.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit's order Tuesday said the identity of the company, long under seal as the grand jury fight has unfolded from the trial court to the U.S. Supreme Court, cannot now be revealed. The appellate judges said the name of the company remains subject to the secrecy rules that govern grand juries “and must, for that reason, remain under seal.”

Prosecutors and the appeals court itself have gone to extraordinary lengths to keep the name of the company under wraps. At a court hearing last year, the D.C. Circuit shut down public access to a courtroom floor, allowing the attorneys in the case—who then had not been identified—to avoid intense media scrutiny.