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 European Parliament: Draft
report: on the draft Council implementing decision on the launch
of automated data exchange with regard to dactyloscopic data
in the United Kingdom (link): Rapporteur: Juan Fernando
López Aguilar:
"1.Rejects the Council
draft;
2.Instructs its President to forward its position to the Council,
the Commission and the national parliaments."
EU: The
EU Integrated Political Crisis Response Arrangements: Operational
Conclusions - IPCR Roundtable 25 March 2020 - COVID-19
(pdf):
"1. Speed up delivery
of medical equipment - 2. Increase repatriation of stranded citizens
- 3. Art 222 TFEU [the 'solidarity
clause']"
From
the « war against the virus » to the war against
exiles : security responses to Covid-19 exacerbate violence at
borders (migreurop,
link)
"The Greek hotspots in
which exiles are crammed without any protection of their rights
or from the pandemic are an example of the precarization of their
trajectories by the security policies of States. Migreurop denounces
the violence inflicted onto exiles in the name of the “war
against the virus”, their unequal treatment with regard
to the pandemic, and demands the immediate closure of all spaces
of migrant detention in order to ensure their right to be protected."
EU/Greece/Turkey: Crisis not averted:
security policies cannot solve a humanitarian problem, now or
in the long-term (pdf)
At the end of February, the
Turkish government announced it would allow refugees to travel
onwards to Greece and Bulgaria, in the hope of extracting from
the EU further financial support as well as backing for its military
operations in Syria. It has now taken up its role as Europe's
border guard again, but the manufactured crisis induced by the
Turkish decision and the EU response highlight the long-term
failings of the EU's asylum and migration model.
EU: MEPs,
migration policy experts call for urgent action to uphold refugee
rights
Over 100 MEPs from four political
groups in the European Parliament have called on the European
Commission to take action so that "fundamental rights and
the right to asylum" are upheld in Greece. Their calls have
been echoed by dozens of migration policy experts working on
EU-funded projects.
From
Windrush to Covid 19: another scandal in the making (IRR News, link): by Frances Webber:
"A review of differential
policies towards different populations draws attention to the
ways in which civil society is mobilising to demand protection
and an end to the stigmatisation of those with no escape from
infection.
The growing coronavirus crisis
has exposed many faultlines in the UK and in Europe, and in particular,
governments’ treatment of refugees, asylum seekers and other
vulnerable and marginalised populations including prisoners and
homeless people, carries disquieting echoes."
Threats
to journalists: The ’new normal’ in Germany (ECPMF, link):
"The European Centre
for Press and Media Freedom publishes results of its five-year
study of attacks on media workers in Germany
...In 2019, with the exception
of three attacks, they all came from right-wing groups. This
confirms the findings of the past four years: media professionals,
journalists and reporters were still most at risk from right-wingers
who despise the press. ECPMF is not aware of any attacks from
the left in 2019."
ENAC:
autorizzati i droni per il monitoraggio (link):
The Italian civil aviation authority
(ENAC, Ente Nazionale Aviazione Civile) has authorised the use
of drones on city streets to strengthen the capabilities of police
forces and municipal councils. Previous limits for their use
that centred on the risk of drones causing damage to people and
things in ordinary circumstances may not apply, considering that
sidewalks are empty and streets are clear, meaning that drones
are useful to monitor gatherings. Derogations to these norms
are motivated as follows:
"With a view to guaranteeing
the containment of the epidemiological 'coronavirus' emergency,
in order to allow operations to monitor the movement of citizens
in the municipal territory envisaged in the decrees of the President
of the Council of Ministers (PM) of 8 and 9 March 2020, it becomes
necessary to derogate from some provisions of the measures in
the ENAC Regulation on 'Remotely Piloted Aircraft', 3rd edition
of November 2019."
Refugee
crisis: latest news from across Europe (17-23.3.20) including:
- Anti-migration cooperation
between the EU, Italy and Libya: some truths
- Erdogan in talks with European
leaders over refugee cash for Turkey
- COVID-19: No one is safe
until All are protected!
Two
new analyses and one new briefing: EU-Italy-Libya cooperation;
Spanish migration policies
Statewatch is today publishing three new in-depth
pieces, examining anti-migration cooperation between the EU,
Italy and Libya; the renewal of Italy's Memorandum of Understanding
with Libya and the accompanying parliamentary debate; and a briefing
outlining demands for the new Spanish government to ensure that
its migration policy respects human rights.
HUNGARY: Orbán
introduces 'Enabling Act' in the name of fighting coronavirus
(Hungarian Spectrum, link):
"Hungarian Prime Minister
Viktor Orbán never lets a crisis go to waste. Friday,
he put before the Hungarian Parliament a law that would give
him dictatorial powers under cover of declaring a state of emergency
to fight the coronavirus. Parliament could vote on this law as
early as Monday."
UK at last follows other
EU states: UK
pubs and restaurants told to shut in virus fight (BBC
News, link):
"Cafes, pubs and restaurants
must close from Friday night, except for take-away food, to tackle
coronavirus, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said.
All the UK's nightclubs, theatres,
cinemas, gyms and leisure centres have also been told to close
"as soon as they reasonably can".
Speaking at a daily Downing
Street press briefing, Mr Johnson said the measures would be
enforced "strictly" and that licensing arrangements
will make doing so "relatively simple"." (emphasis added)
UK: Undercover
policing inquiry: secretive Met unit shredded files (The
Guardian, link):
"A secretive Scotland
Yard intelligence unit shredded a large number of documents after
a public inquiry was set up into the undercover infiltration
of political groups, a watchdog has found."
Over
400 migrants returned to Libya over weekend (InfoMigrants, link):
"Over 400 migrants have
been picked up by the Libyan coast guard and returned to Libya
over the weekend. That’s according to the International
Organization for Migration (IOM), which called the action “unacceptable.”"
Refugee
crisis: latest news from across Europe (10-16.3.20) including:
- Little new on migration in
Commission's plan for a "comprehensive strategy with Africa"
- More calls for EU and Greece
to uphold international law and refugee rights
- Turkey steps back from confrontation
at Greek border
- Border externalisation: agreements
on Frontex ops in Serbia and Montenegro head for approval
Brussels
considers pan-EU police searches of ID photos (Politico, link):
"Ready for your closeup?
Your face could soon be included in police databases searchable
by law enforcement across the European Union."
ITALY: Coronavirus:
critical situation in prisons and detention centres
A note issued on 12 March by
the ombudsman for people denied their freedom in jails and places
of detention on describes the situation as "relatively"
calm, despite problems resulting from disturbances and violence
in numerous prisons in the past days.
EU: Border
externalisation: Agreements on Frontex operations in Serbia and
Montenegro heading for parliamentary approval
On 29 January the civil liberties
committee of the European Parliament (LIBE) approved the conclusion
of status agreements on the actions on the European Border and
Coast Guard Agency (Frontex) on the territory of two neighbouring
non-EU states - Serbia and Montenegro.
Top reports
See: Resources
for researchers: Statewatch Analyses: 1999-ongoing
SECILE Project:
Borderline: The EU's New Border Surveillance Initiatives:
Assessing the Costs and Fundamental Rights Implications of EUROSUR
and the "Smart Borders" Proposals (pdf) A study by the
Heinrich Böll Foundation. Written by Dr. Ben Hayes and Mathias
Vermeulen: "Unable to tackle the root of the problem,
the member states are upgrading the Union’s external borders.
Such a highly parochial approach taken to a massive scale threatens
some of the EU’s fundamental values - under the pretence
that one’s own interests are at stake. Such an approach
borders on the inhumane."
How the EU works and justice and home
affairs decision-making (pdf)
Statewatch's
20th Anniversary Conference, June 2011: Statewatch
conference speeches
TNI/Statewatch:
Counter-terrorism,
'policy laundering' and the FATF - legalising surveillance, regulating
civil society
(pdf) by Ben Hayes
Statewatch publication:
Guide
to EU decision-making and justice and home affairs after the
Lisbon Treaty
(pdf) by Steve Peers, Professor of Law, University of Essex,
with additional material by Tony Bunyan
Neoconopticon: the EU security-industrial
complex
(pdf) by Ben Hayes
The Shape of Things to Come (pdf) by Tony Bunyan
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