Brussels, 29/01/2001 (Agence Europe) - In a working document by the Directorate General for Studies in the European Parliament, the lawyer Pierre Berthelet (whose opinions do not reflect those of the EP) describes the progress achieved over the last years in the third pillar of the EU Treaty. The title of this work is "Police and Justice in the European Union", but the author feels that it would premature for the moment to associate these terms with "European police" and "European justice". In fact, he underlines, "Eurojust is only at the planning stage. Europol is only an improved information clearing house and "eurocrimes" are only a grouping of harmonised national infringements". He also notes that, before achieving a "federal penal law", judicial cooperation must still overcome new challenges: thus, he recalls, Europol does not have the power of coercion (and "without this power, there is not true European police force"), and at the judicial level only the Member States have the competence for incrimination. However, feels Mr Berthelet, "we are progressively working towards a federal police and justice system"; "the fight against cross border organised crime, and more specifically organised crime, is a powerful vector for the integration of penal law", as it requires a constant tightening of the present cooperation which in turn "can only be achieved through an integration of police and judicial cooperation". This law is in "gestation", noted Mr Berthelet, for whom there is the progressive appearance of the "embryos of a federal penal system: - a federal police force, which will be Europol; - the creation of a federal prosecutor incarnated by Eurojust; - the creation of federal crimes", which will be the "eurocrimes".
Mr Berthelet recalls that the idea to establish a "European Legal Area", had been launched first by President Valery Giscard d'Estaing, during the European Council on 5 and 6 December in Brussels, but that the attempt was "a failure", due to the reticence of certain Member States. He also recalls that France had once more, on 25 October 1982, proposed a second plan foreseeing, firstly, the adoption of an extradition convention and then the establishment of a "European penal court", but that three Member States are opposed to this. European cooperation in this field had only truly started in the years following the entry into force of the Maastricht Treaty, and the law elaborated in this Treaty "is becoming increasingly consistent" with an accumulation of legal standards that "truly give the impression of a European penal law", noted the author. Mr Berthelet who recognises that the allocation of additional prerogatives to Europol would raise the problem of its control, necessary in a democratic society, says that even the absence of checks "could transform Europol into a monster". To conclude, he works towards underlining the dynamic that has developed in the last few years - and which has lead to the ambitious plan adopted by the Tampere European Council on 15 and 16 October 1999 - by recalling in particular that the Member States, in order to fight more effectively against organised crime, are notably studying the possibility of creating new instruments, such as, a European arrest warrant.
(Directorate General Studies, Social and Legal Affairs Division. Brussels Tel: s02 284 27 53, Fax: 02 284 90 50, E-mail: jantoine@europarl.eu.int).