Clash over plans for EU anti-terrorism system

MEPs criticise plans to track terrorist finance, while setting up system could cost as much as €47m.

Cecilia Malmström, the European commissioner for home affairs, has picked a fight with the European Parliament over her proposal to set up an EU system to track terrorist financing

A paper drafted by Malmström and adopted by the college of European commissioners yesterday (13 July) states that the plan is a response to requests from member states and MEPs.

But Sophie in ’t Veld, a Dutch Liberal MEP, said that the three options outlined in the paper are “absolutely not in line with what we asked”.

She likened the approach by Malmström to “policy laundering”, and asked: “Why do we bother having parliamentary scrutiny?”

Alexander Alvaro, a German Liberal MEP, said: “What we asked the Commission for was a proposal for a European extraction system, a software tool, not a terrorist finance tracking system.”

Timothy Kirkhope, an MEP with the European Conservatives and Reformists group, welcomed Malmström’s plan. “We must have our own systems in place to trace and eliminate terrorist threats,” he said. “Our efforts so far have been dependent on the US’s operations whereas they should be complementary to them.”

Last summer, the Parliament endorsed a controversial agreement with the United States on the sharing of financial data, on condition that the European Commission proposed a system that would allow the extraction on European soil of specific data sought by the US. Under the agreement, SWIFT – a private company that handles electronic banking data – sends bulk data to the US, which are processed there to give clues to terrorist activity.

“All we wanted was extraction on European soil, and now we are going to set up this whole system,” said in ’t Veld, whose report on EU counter-terrorism policy was adopted by the Parliament’s civil liberties committee on Tuesday (12 July).

Malmström’s paper raises the possibility of going beyond the existing EU-US agreement to include national transfers and organised-crime investigations in a future EU system.

System costs

The Malmström paper puts the cost of creating an EU terrorist-finance tracking system at €33 million-€47m, with estimated annual running costs of €7m-€11m.

The three options it outlines each combine EU-level and national functions. The results of an impact assessment are expected by the end of the year, focusing on the need for and proportionality of possible measures – issues that have come under intense scrutiny during the first year of the SWIFT agreement. With a nod to the impact assessment, the paper sidesteps the most contentious questions concerning a future EU programme, notably its scope, retention periods, and individuals’ rights to access and deletion.

The paper acknowledges the “political importance of the issue” and its “legal and technical complexity”, and pleads for “sufficient time” before the Commission has to submit a legislative proposal to member states and MEPs.

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