Brussels, 08/07/2014 (Agence Europe) - More than a month has passed since the attack at the Jewish Museum in Brussels on 24 May, which saw four people killed. A few weeks earlier, the perpetrator of the attack, Mehdi Nemmouche from France had returned from Syria. In the evening of Monday 7 July, the ministers for home affairs from nine EU member states met in Milan, with the aim of taking concrete measures to tackle European combatants who have gone to wage jihad in Syria. Some of these measures will begin the committee procedure next week.
Gilles de Kerchove, EU coordinator for the fight against terrorism, said at a press briefing that Italian, French, Belgian, Spanish, British, Polish, German, Swedish and Dutch ministers (Ireland had hoped to attend but ultimately was unable to) reached an agreement on a working document to: - enhance information exchange and “maximise” the use of instruments, such as the Schengen Information System (SIS), which provides data on the people and objects being sought; - better coordination between their respective national passenger data exchange programmes (“PNR units”), which are expected to be “the basis for a possible European PNR system”, emphasised the Belgian coordinator. The ministers also plan to step up discussions with Europol, which has set up a contact point on the subject, as well as with third countries, particularly Turkey, which is considered as a major crossing point for jihadists.
De Kerchove said that the measures were mostly technical and would need to be validated by all Schengen area states but that this should not pose any difficulty. The United Kingdom itself has requested that it be linked up to the SIS. In October, Italian Minister for Home Affairs Angelino Alfano is expected to meet with his home affairs counterparts in Luxembourg, with an action plan to promote a European-level approach for all of these measures discussed between the nine member states, reported the coordinator.
Ministers also addressed a number of particularly sensitive themes such as the very proactive propaganda of the Jihadi groups on the internet and the level of monitoring that should be made of this in consultation with access providers and internet giants such as Google and Twitter. In October, a meeting is also expected to take place on this matter with ministers, with the idea of pooling possible responses and developing counter-propaganda websites (the websites would highlight the dangers of going to Syria) or closing down illegal websites. Another discussion involves the possible beefing up of controls at airports, with flights to Iraq and Syria being particularly targeted. The US made a request on 2 July to Europeans to step up security in their airports, due to new terrorist threats, linked particularly to Iraq, which the French, German, British and Belgian airports have done. Iraq is once again causing concerns and “the recent developments in the country demonstrate the need for immediate action”, said de Kerchove. Iraq is appearing more attractive and “will have a great impact”. In this respect, the well-developed communications strategy of certain groups such as the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) is significantly contributing to it and the departure of Europeans to Iraq this summer is likely.
Just as at their previous meeting at the beginning of June in Luxembourg (see EUROPE 11095), ministers again referred to the possibility of more targeted checks on Europeans coming back from third countries to the EU. The member states present and the coordinator also looked at the possibility of not just verifying the validity of identity documents but of crosschecking them with other databases, notably those used for people being sought or who have already been flagged up in other member states. Targeting the departure points of certain flights more comprehensively would also help circumvent some of the more rigid aspects of the Schengen Code. According to this code, only minimal verification (simple identity controls) can be applied to European nationals.
With regard to the infringement of travelling abroad with the purpose of fighting, the question of harmonisation between member states also arises and the coordinator stated that he is awaiting a report on this precise point from Eurojust this autumn. Here again, however, it would still be difficult to strike the right balance between security and respect for freedom because, as the coordinator pointed out, “going to Turkey”, for example, “is not be a crime!” (SP)