Brussels, 18/06/2013 (Agence Europe) - Just a few days after meeting her American counterpart, Eric Holder, in Dublin for a discussion on the aims of the Prism surveillance programme, Commissioner Viviane Reding - in an article that appeared in the New York Times, on 17 June - urged Europeans to adopt the new European rules on data protection as quickly as possible to ensure greater protection of citizens from this kind of surveillance. She expressed the hope that the United States would provide Europeans with the same possibilities for appeal on its territory. In her article, Reding was visibly not convinced by the answers given by Holder last Friday. She openly criticised the scope of the programme which, she says, places European citizens under surveillance and would probably be deemed anti-constitutional if applied to US nationals. Holder said on Friday that the programme conducted by the National Security Agency specifically targeted non-Americans. While the scale of the programme is not yet completely clear, Europeans are at a severe disadvantage compared to American citizens who can challenge any violation of their data in court - this appeal not being possible for EU nationals.
Reding takes the view that the revelation of the existence of such a programme must be a wake-up call for all European decision-makers, whether in Council or in the European Parliament, which is extremely divided over reform of the 1995 directive. (SP/transl.jl)