Luxembourg, 09/06/2016 (Agence Europe) - At their meeting in Luxembourg on Thursday 9 June, EU Justice Ministers and representatives continued their discussions on the proposal introduced on 19 January by the European Commissioner for Justice, Vera Jourova. This proposal seeks to extend the European Criminal Records Information System (ECRIS) to nationals from non-EU countries.
This extension was proposed in the wake of the Paris attacks in November 2015 and seeks to facilitate information exchange on criminal convictions for both EU citizens and those from third countries (see EUROPE 11471).
Ministers were not obliged to make any decisions but to give their views on the appropriateness of setting up a centralised information system, contrary to the Commission approach based on a decentralised mechanism. This centralised approach would involve the member states providing information at a national level to the same database, which could help facilitate information exchange between the authorities in other member states.
Although a majority of delegations supported this approach, according to one European source, others expressed misgivings, particularly with regard to technical considerations. These questions focus on the relevance of an automated or semi automated system, as well as data protection and encrypting questions. The latter delegations, such as the United Kingdom, therefore requested more time to formulate their respective positions. As a country directly affected by the 2015 attacks, France also said that it was crucial that digital fingerprinting of nationals from third countries is taken into account in the system so that it is possible to ensure that the crimes or misdemeanours have indeed been committed by the same person.
The aim is to reach an agreement by the end of the year. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)