On Thursday 23 March, the members of the committee on civil liberties of the European Parliament again debated the fight against terrorism, at a hearing the day after an attack in London that left three people dead and more than 20 injured (EUROPE 11751).
The European Commissioner for the Security Union, Julian King, made an emotional address at the start of the session, noting that the attack, for which Islamic State has since claimed responsibility, was certainly no accident, as it came on the anniversary of the attacks on Brussels of 22 March 2016.
The Commissioner once again stressed the efforts that must be made (and that have been made to date) on information-sharing. "Promises to reinforce this exchange are becoming increasingly important", he told the MEPs. For its part, the European Commission has always asked the "member states to make full use of the information exchange systems" and has been working flat out in recent years to plug all gaps.
The British Commissioner recalled the action taken by the EU since the attacks of 2015, such as adopting the PNR system to collect airline passenger data, actions to facilitate the interoperability of information systems and, more recently, proposed changes to the Schengen Information System, introducing new alert categories. King told the MEPs that there would never be a zero risk, but that it was possible to make it harder and harder to carry out attacks.
At the time of the hearing, the police services of Antwerp, Belgium, were also on alert, as an individual had also tried to drive into a crowd, but had been intercepted in advance.
The President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, was expected to discuss the Westminster attack with British Prime Minister Theresa May at some point during the day. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)