On Tuesday 17 April, the European Commission presented new rules in Strasbourg aiming to make it harder to acquire the precursors to explosives used by terrorists to fabricate the home-made bombs that have been "used in many attacks in Europe in recent years", Commissioners Dimitris Avramoupoulos (Internal Affairs) and Julian King (Security) stated at a press conference.
In particular, the Commission proposed strengthening the current rules by firstly banning new chemical substances, by revising an earlier regulation that entered into force in 2013. More specifically, it extends the existing list of products enabling the production of home-made bombs to two new substances, which can currently be acquired legally both at physical points of sale and with online retailers.
It is "urgent to take action against the chemical substances", Avramopoulos stated, adding that currently "we can all buy acetone or ammonium nitrate" and that this is enough "to fabricate TATP in your garage – the preferred explosive of terrorists recently". Sulphuric acid is also covered by these new restrictions.
The Commission also proposed to put an end to certain registration systems in the member states that only require a single presentation of an identity card in order to register the purchases of chemical substances. The proposal for revision of the regulation also involves the licensing systems: the EU27 will be able to authorise the granting of licences to purchase a limited number of regulated substances, but before granting this licence, they will be required to verify the legitimacy of the request and the profile of the purchasers, especially their criminal profile and any possible "criminal files".
The new regulation further highlights the improvement of the exchange of information between vendor companies and competent authorities in case of suspicious behaviour. The new rules introduce a requirement for companies to report a suspect transaction to the authorities responsible within 24 hours. The companies concerned will also have to exchange information between them.
Since the regulation's entry into force on 1 May 2013, member states have reported a rise in suspect transactions, the Commission states in its rules. It also states that these home-made bombs have recently been the most murderous in Europe, used in Madrid in 2004, for example, and in London in 2005, Paris in 2015, Brussels in 2016 and Manchester and Parsons Green in 2017.
Firearms trafficking
Alongside its rules on precursors to explosives, the Commission has also updated the EU's rules on the export and import of firearms for civilian use, which will notably provide for the improvement of control procedures. Under this recommendation that updates a 2012 text, the member states will have to examine systematically the history of all people wanting export authorisation, notably by using the European Criminal Records Information System (ECRIS), to verify if the interested party has been the subject of any criminal sentences and consulting the information system on export control of Conventional Arms (COARM), which contains the reports for the refusal to grant export authorisation. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)