Brussels, 11/05/2004 (Agence Europe) - The College appears prepared to go beyond the opposition of the European Parliament and give a green light to the conclusion of an agreement on the transfer of airline passenger data for flights to the US. European Commissioners will have to indicated on Wednesday if the draft agreement respects European legislation by offering an "adequate" level of personal data protection. The ultimate concern of some Commissioners was that approval of this decision took into account the opinion of the committee on Article 31 of the directive on data protection. Given on Tuesday afternoon, this opinion is in favour, although Luxembourg and Italian representatives voted against, indicated sources close to the case.
European Commissioner for justice and home affairs, Antonio Vitorino, declared from Washington that the European Commission decision "will probably" judge that the agreement was compatible with European rules. It considered that the General Affairs Council would probable in the follow-up, approve the decision itself next Monday. The Commissioner also thought that this would make the European Parliament going to the Court of Justice unnecessary, given that this involved a request for a preliminary opinion to the conclusion of the agreement and that the agreement was expected to be concluded before the Court reached a verdict. He did not rule out other initiatives from Parliament.
At the end of April the European Parliament decided to go to the Court for a decision from the latter n the level of data protection to be included in the agreement and called on the Council to wait for this decision to be given, which the Court could take up to a year to reach, before signing the agreement (EUROPE 22 April p 12). At the same time, the EP refused to give a decision on even the draft of the agreement, as it wanted to wait for the Court's opinion. None of these initiatives are binding on the Council, which could, nonetheless conclude the agreement. On 4 May, meeting for the first time with representatives of the new Member States, the European Parliament again refused to give a decision (301 for, 343 against and 18 abstentions) on the agreement. Ms Boogerd-Quaak EP rapporteur on the draft said that they had voted five times against the agreement and expressed her hope that the Council would finally understand that no meant no.