Brussels, 07/10/2005 (Agence Europe) - Several debates but very few decisions are expected from the Justice and Home Affairs Council to be held on 12 October in Luxembourg, followed the next day by a meeting of the EU/Russia Permanent Partnership Council (at the level of JHA ministers) during which the re-admission and visa facilitation agreements will be initialled (see EUROPE 9042).
At the JHA Council, ministers are first of all expected to adopt conclusions on the regional protection programmes. The Council is to specify its support to the approach proposed by the European Commission in its communication of 1 September 2005, which defines the general framework in which pilot programmes for regional protection will be implemented. The development and the implementation of these programmes are due to be conducted in close cooperation with the High Commissioner for Refugees (HCR). In this capacity, High Commissioner Antonio Guterres will attend a ministerial lunch on 12 October. The first regional protection programme, which will be a pilot programme, will be implemented in Ukraine, Moldova and Belarus, as well as in sub-Saharan Africa. It will mainly concern the strengthening of already existent protection capacities, mainly by providing practical support for the processing of asylum requests, the strengthening of alternative protection, integration and data retention.
Ministers must also adopt conclusions on information-sharing between Member State's law enforcement authorities. These conclusions will mainly cover Organised Crime Threat Assessment, OCTA, to be carried out by Europol as of 1 January 2006 as part of the action plan that embodies The Hague Programme adopted by the Council on 3 June 2005. OCTA aims to further develop a common intelligence model by Europol and Member States. It will be conducted by Europol with the use of criminal intelligence from Member States intelligence services, European agencies such as Eurojust and third country agencies with which Europol has signed agreements. Assessment of the threat of organised crime will serve as a tool for the Council for adopting priority strategies that the law enforcement authorities are to use against crime. In addition to adopting these conclusions, a difficult debate awaits ministers on data retention. Also to be addressed are the questions of combating terrorism and environmental crime. The debate on illegal immigration will also be discussed at the Council given the recent incidents between Morocco and Spain.