EU announces new measures to combat terrorism
Spurred to action by last month's terror attacks in France, European Union leaders have agreed on an ambitious range of new steps to better protect their countries from terrorism.
Spurred to action by last month's terror attacks in France, European Union leaders have agreed on an ambitious range of new steps to better protect their countries from terrorism.
Actions endorsed at an EU summit meeting include the sharing of airline passenger data, tougher border controls on travellers and the detection and removal of internet content promoting terrorism or extremism.
"All citizens have the right to live free from fear, whatever their opinions or beliefs," the EU leaders declared in a joint statement. "We will safeguard our common values and protect all from violence based on ethnic or religious motivations and racism."
Gilles de Kerchove, the EU's top counterterrorism official, said that the leaders' action plan, some of which still requires approval by the European Parliament to go into effect, will make Europeans safer.
It "keeps reducing our vulnerabilities", De Kerchove said. In a report to the 28 EU member countries last month, De Kerchove warned "Europe is facing an unprecedented, diverse and serious terrorist threat". Counterterrorism policy shot to the top of the EU agenda following the January 7-9 attacks in Paris against the satirical weekly , a policewoman and a kosher grocery store that claimed a total of 17 victims. The three gunmen, who proclaimed allegiance to al-Qaeda in Yemen and Islamic State, were also shot dead by French police.
The attacks mobilised France and other EU member countries to seek more effective ways to deal with armed Islamic militancy, especially the problem of radicalised European-born Muslims who go to fight in Syria or Iraq and then return home.
The plan approved by the heads of state and government calls for a wide array of measures in fields ranging from foreign policy to the functioning of law enforcement agencies. In some instances, it insists on the need for rapid or urgent change. At a news conference, European Parliament President Martin Schulz signaled his clear willingness to cooperate, but said there are red lines he and other lawmakers will refuse to cross.
He endorsed more systematic passport and customs controls on people coming and going from the so-called Schengen area of 26 European countries, 22 of which are EU members, but said movement inside that zone must remain unhindered.
Schulz also warned rashly curtailing individual rights in the name of boosting safety would play into the terrorists' hands by discrediting Western democracy.
"We need to be a state of law and democracy," Schulz said. "We need to protect our values."
Finnish PM Alexander Stubb said it was imperative to strike "a careful balance between civil liberties and security".
An earlier attempt to launch an EU-wide exchange of air traveller data failed in 2013 when it was rejected it on civil liberties grounds.
On Wednesday, European Parliament members, by a 532-136 vote, pledged to work toward getting a passenger name record programme enacted by the end of 2015, but insisted the EU simultaneously rewrite its rules on data collection and sharing to ensure legally-binding protections.
