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| Europe |
| Britain & EU set for row over terrorism |
| 2004-03-30 |
| Britain is set to block new European Union civil liberties laws unless they are changed to help the fight against terrorism. The row is over laws which would let immigration authorities and governments have access to potentially vital air passenger records - but only for 24 hours. Home Office minister Caroline Flint, standing in for Home Secretary David Blunkett, will tell the meeting that the time limit was hopeless for security agencies pursuing information in the event of a terrorist atrocity. Equally unacceptable to the UK is a provision restricting access to airline information only to immigration officials - and not to the police. The restrictions are designed to safeguard civil liberties. But the UK says that, in the wake of the need to respond to the terrorist threat, the proposals will make a mockery of counter-terrorism pledges. During negotiations so far UK officials have added a clause to the provisions stating that member states should be allowed to apply their own national arrangements for data access, as long as they do not conflict with EU data protection rules. That would mean the UK Data Protection Act could apply - allowing the holding of information where necessary for much longer and also making sure it could be passed to the police and not just used by immigration services. But all other member states oppose the idea and want the UK to remove the clause: "We are isolated," explained one official. But the Government will make clear that it will simply block all agreement - the rules require unanimous approval - unless there is much more flexibility to wage the fight against terrorism. |
| Posted by:Bulldog |
| #4 Don't let the privacy lobby win this one. This lobby, which is extensive in the U.S., doesn't believe in privacy, a reasonable right to protection from unwanted intrusion. What they want is invisibility: that there should be NO government capability to monitor suspicious behavior. This lobby, led by the ACLU in the US and many so-called privacy rights groups have already cost us 3,000 lives thanks to their lobbying for the 1995 law that forbid the FBI and CIA from sharing info. The are the biggest opponents of the PATRIOT Act, which they apparently believe has destroyed civil liberties (of course they can't show any instances where it's done any such thing...) You can always tell someone in this lobby. They're always seeing "potential" violations of "privacy," no matter how infinestimal the risk or absurd the possibility. The government is always this far from being a "Nazi" regime with unlimited power. Beware of these types. They cloak themselves in what sound like high moral values, but what they really want is complete anonymity for everyone. Complete anonymity to do whatever the hell they want, no matter what the cost to the rest of us... |
| Posted by: RMcLeod 2004-03-30 7:50:50 PM |
| #3 Aris, it's not just you. Seems Ananova's decided to go crap recently, keeping no stories in archive and having just the ten-or-whatever most recent stories online. I'm an Orange customer, and I haven't figured out whether or not I personally can get a better service from them. I guess people will just stop using their services if it stays as bad as this... |
| Posted by: Bulldog 2004-03-30 1:54:39 PM |
| #2 I can't get this news story to show -- anyone else having the same problem or is it just my computer acting up? mojo> I don't think that this has anything at all to do with the Constitution. |
| Posted by: Aris Katsaris 2004-03-30 11:24:59 AM |
| #1 Gee, maybe they should WRITE INTO THE CONSTITUTION that the cops get only 4 coffee breaks per watch, just to be sure, y'know?... |
| Posted by: mojo 2004-03-30 10:50:54 AM |