The European Commissioner for Justice, Věra Jourová, took stock on Tuesday 29 January with the MEPs of the European Parliament's Civil Liberties Committee (LIBE) on a whole series of issues ranging from the fight against money laundering to the protection of the integrity of European elections and the protection of personal data.
Before MEPs, she defended the legislative proposals on cross-border access to electronic evidence and reminded MEPs of the urgent need to adopt them. While the EU Council has already adopted its position on the Regulation (see EUROPE 12003), the European Parliament has several concerns and intends to take its time to examine all the implications of the legislative text (see EUROPE 12156).
"The mutual legal assistance procedures are not fast enough for the digital age and - I would like to say it very clearly - cannot be improved in a satisfactory manner for the purpose of collecting e-evidence", she said.
"The European Investigation Order is very important, but time limits are too long and Ireland - a country where many service providers are located - is not part of it", she continued.
The rapporteur on this dossier, Birgit Sippel (S&D, Germany), confirmed that there are still many details to be examined, to ensure that the regulation does not dilute the safeguards that exist in this area.
Ms Jourová also indicated that the Commission would adopt on 6 February next - and not Wednesday 30 January as initially planned - its recommendation for an EU Council decision authorising the opening of negotiations for an EU-US agreement on cross-border access to electronic evidence in criminal proceedings (see EUROPE 12165).
"We are not looking to implement the US CLOUD ACT into EU law nor to negotiate under the terms of the CLOUD ACT. Our starting point is the EU's interest", the Commissioner said.
Privacy Shield. She also presented to MEPs the results of the second evaluation of the transatlantic data protection system, the "Privacy Shield" (see EUROPE 12163).
"I am pleased to report that our joint pressure has born fruit on the Privacy Shield ombudsperson", she said, referring to Keith Krach's appointment to the position on 18 January.
The Commission had given the US authorities until 28 February 2019 to appoint this permanent mediator (see EUROPE 12163), while in a resolution adopted in July, the European Parliament called for the suspension of the system if the US authorities did not comply fully with it by 1 September 2018 (see EUROPE 12056).
But the system remains highly criticised in Parliament. Dutch MEP Sophie in't Veld (ALDE) also expressed doubts about the independence of the appointed mediator, in view of his past and the functions he performs in parallel.
Golden Visas. The Commission's recent report on citizenship and residence by investment programmes, often referred to as golden visas (see EUROPE 12178), also failed to convince MEPs. Several of them considered that its conclusions were "weak" and that the report did not contain any real recommendations.
For Sophie in't Veld, the Commission should have, "for once, shown courage" and recommended a ban on golden visas. (Original version in French by Marion Fontana)