As the Council of the European Union prepares to adopt its position on Friday on the proposal for a regulation introducing European orders for the production and storage of electronic evidence that can be directly addressed to a service provider in another Member State (see EUROPE 12003), on Wednesday 5 December, civil society launched a final appeal.
In a letter sent to all Member States' Permanent Representations to the EU, 18 civil society organisations, including European Digital Rights (EDRi), the Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE) and La Quadrature du Net, invite Member States to oppose the adoption of a general approach on the compromise text and to seriously reconsider the Council's position.
The organisations join the position of the eight Member States - the Netherlands, Germany, the Czech Republic, Finland, Latvia, Sweden, Hungary and Greece - which had written to the European Commission and the Austrian Presidency of the Council of the EU to argue in favour of an enhanced notification procedure, including grounds for refusal of enforcement for the notified authority (see EUROPE 12146).
The EDRi already had serious concerns about the European Commission's initial proposal (see EUROPE 12004) and generally considers that the text that the Council is about to adopt weakens the protection of fundamental rights and privacy even further.
"The compromise presented by the Austrian Presidency does not meet our concerns", Maryant Fernández Pérez, political adviser at the EDRi, told EUROPE on Thursday 6 December.
According to the organisation, the text also considerably reduces the possibility for enforcement authorities to refuse to enforce a decision on the basis of a violation of the Charter of Fundamental Rights. Several references to the Charter would have been deleted from the Council's text, she explained.
If the Council does not move, the European Parliament could decide to reject the Commission's proposal and focus on improving existing tools. This would be "the ideal position", according to Maryant Fernández Pérez.
For the time being, Parliament rapporteur Birgit Sippel (S&D, Germany) intends to take her time to carefully analyse the implications of this regulation (see EUROPE 12147) and to present the results in several working documents. The European Parliament is unlikely to adopt its position before the European elections. (Original version in French by Marion Fontana)