US embassy cable - 04BRUSSELS5128

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 BRUSSELS 005128 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DHS FOR IAO, BORDER PATROL 
DOJ FOR CRM 
ROME ALSO FOR INS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL, PTER, CMGT, CVIS, KCRM, EUN, USEU BRUSSELS 
SUBJECT: JHA: MINISTERS REVIEW COUNTER-TERROR 
MEASURES 
 
 
SUMMARY 
------- 
1.  The EU Council of Justice and Home Affairs 
Ministers (JHA Council) on December 2 agreed on a 
series of documents relating to the fight against 
terrorism in preparation for the December 17 
European Council.  These include a strategy against 
the financing of terrorism, a report on intelligence 
capacity, conclusions on prevention, preparedness 
and response to terrorist attacks, and an EU 
solidarity program on the consequences of terrorist 
threats and attacks.  In other justice issues, the 
Council agreed on the main body of a draft Decision 
on the exchange of information from national 
criminal records.  Ministers also concurred on a 
general approach for the exchange of information and 
cooperation concerning terrorist offences, and 
defined guidelines for a piece of EU legislation 
requiring telecom service providers to retain data 
defined in a common list.  Full text of Council 
conclusions has been transmitted to EUR/ERA and 
Embassy The Hague.  END SUMMARY. 
 
EXCHANGE OF INFORMATION FROM CRIMINAL RECORDS 
--------------------------------------------- 
2.  The December 2 JHA Council agreed on the main 
provisions of a draft Decision on the exchange of 
information from criminal records.  The draft, 
tabled in reaction to a cross-border serial killer 
case that revealed failures in communication between 
French and Belgian authorities, requires each 
central authority of a Member State to inform 
without delay the central authorities of the other 
Member States of criminal convictions and subsequent 
measures in respect of nationals of those countries 
entered in their criminal records.  "Furthermore, a 
central authority may request information from the 
criminal records of another Member State.  The reply 
shall be sent immediately and in any event within a 
period not exceeding ten working days from the 
receipt of the request, under certain conditions." 
The preamble and forms to be annexed to the draft 
Decision will be discussed at a later stage. 
 
3.  EU sources noted that criminal convictions in EU 
countries are recorded by using a variety of 
procedures in registers.  Exchange mechanisms do 
exist for the transmission of information between 
countries, e.g. under the 1959 European Convention 
on Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters, but they 
fail to meet the requirements of cooperation in a 
frontier-free area.  Recent pedophilia cases 
highlighted the malfunctioning of these systems. 
Likewise, the fight against terrorism requires the 
quality of these exchanges to be improved quickly. 
 
TERRORISM: PREPARATION OF EU SUMMIT 
----------------------------------- 
4.  EU leaders on December 17 will adopt a number of 
strategies, prepared in response to mandates from 
the June 2004 European Council conclusions, 
including on combating the financing of terrorism as 
well as the protection of critical infrastructures. 
The leaders will discuss proposals on integrating 
the fight against terrorism into the EU's external 
relations policy, an assessment of CT provisions in 
EU agreements, and a "Conceptual Framework" on the 
contribution of ESDP to the fight against terrorism. 
Dutch Justice Minister Donner said the JHA Council 
agreed to forward to the leaders, through the 
channel of EU FMs (GAERC), a series of documents 
(not publicly available, unless otherwise indicated 
below with source of publication and ref. number): 
 
-A revised Action Plan on combating terrorism; 
 
-A strategy on the fight against the financing of 
 terrorism, to be reviewed by Ministers for the 
 Economy and Finance on December 7 and the GAERC on 
 December 13; 
 
-A report on intelligence capacity.  Dutch Interior 
 Minister Remkes told a press conference it was 
 "vital" for EU countries to discuss cooperation 
 between their intelligence agencies.  Remkes said 
 all delegations were "convinced of the need to 
 work together on this."  The EU SitCen located in 
 the Council Secretariat would be "expanded and 
 reinforced."  Ministers asked their 
 representatives at the EUROPOL management board to 
 agree at their next meeting on December 14 on an 
 exchange of letters with SG/HighRep Solana; 
 
-Conclusions on Prevention, Preparedness and 
 Response to Terrorist Attacks (in draft at 
 http://register.consilium.eu.int, doc #15232/04); 
 
-An EU solidarity program on the consequences of 
 the terrorist threats and attacks: a 
 revised/widened Chemical, Bacteriological, 
 Radiological and Nuclear program (idem, doc 
 #15480/04). 
 
5.  The Council also noted: 
 
- An interim report on the peer evaluation of 
 national anti-terrorism arrangements (not 
 available).  The 15 Member States evaluated 
 (former EU-15) will report by June 2005 on 
 measures taken with regard to the recommendations 
 of the report; 
 
-A document on the recruitment of terrorists (n/a). 
 
6. Council discussions focused on: 
 
a) Information sharing:  the Conclusions refer to 
the "principle of availability" highlighted in the 
new multiannual JHA program ("The Hague program," 
see USEU BRUSSELS 4789 and USEU Brussels 4619), 
noting work underway on other proposals, including 
the Decision on the exchange of information and co- 
operation concerning terrorist offences (below). 
 
b) Combating the financing of terrorism:  the 
conclusions note the "significant progress" recorded 
on the third money laundering Directive and the 
Regulation on cash movements.  Action is also needed 
to meet other recommendations in the strategy, 
including with respect to the freezing of terrorist 
assets; 
 
c) Civil protection and critical infrastructure: 
the Member States, Commission and Council will have 
"to enhance the quality of their risk assessment and 
analysis, to strengthen the political and 
operational preparedness and capability for 
consequence management, to increase learning, 
training and exercises as well as to examine 
questions of interoperability."  The Member States 
and Commission will "contribute to the ongoing 
assessment of capabilities available at the European 
level and to obtain and share, on a restricted 
basis, information on relevant vaccines, sera and 
other medical resources, that might be made 
available in the event of a major terrorist attack"; 
 
d) Recruitment and radicalization:  "Action to 
combat terrorism cannot succeed in the longer term 
if no action is taken to try to limit recruitment 
into terrorism."   The Hague program calls on the 
Council, with the EU CT Coordinator, the Commission 
and Member State experts, to develop, by the end of 
2005, a long-term strategy to address the factors 
contributing to radicalization and recruitment for 
terrorist activities. 
 
7.  The Council conclusions as well as Coordinator 
de Vries and Commissioner Frattini in their public 
comments stressed the importance of implementation 
of measures agreed by the EU:  "Member States still 
retain full responsibility for ensuring they have in 
place appropriate national structures and 
instruments to enable them to achieve the underlying 
objective: to combat terrorism effectively." 
 
EXCHANGE OF INFORMATION ON TERRORIST OFFENCES 
--------------------------------------------- 
8.  The Council agreed on "a general approach" of a 
Decision on the exchange of information and 
cooperation concerning terrorist offences.  The 
draft is designed to reinforce a December 2002 
Decision concerning the implementation of specific 
measures for police and judicial cooperation to 
combat terrorism.  According to the draft, each 
Member State "shall designate a specialized service 
within its police services or other law enforcement 
authorities that will have access to and collect all 
relevant information concerning and resulting from 
criminal investigations conducted by its law 
enforcement authorities with respect to terrorist 
offences, and send it to Europol."  Each Member 
State will also designate a national correspondent 
for terrorism matters or an appropriate judicial or 
other competent authority that will have access to 
and can collect all relevant information concerning 
prosecutions and convictions for terrorist offences, 
and send it to Eurojust, the EU body established in 
2002 to enhance the effectiveness of investigation 
and prosecution of serious cross-border and 
organized crime. 
 
RETENTION OF DATA BY TELECOM SERVICE PROVIDERS 
--------------------------------------------- - 
9.  The Council discussed the scope of a draft 
Framework Decision, tabled in light of the March 
2004 EU Declaration on combating terrorism, 
requiring providers of publicly available electronic 
communications services or networks to retain 
specified data to allow for the source, routing, 
destination, time, date and duration of 
communications to be established.  In its original 
form, the proposal appeared to be limited to data 
already processed and stored for billing, commercial 
and other legitimate purposes.  However, as noted in 
the Council conclusions, "the approach would imply 
that the possibilities for access to data for law 
enforcement purposes depend on the technical and 
commercial setup of each individual service 
provider."  Some service providers, as Minister 
Donner noted, apply a "flat rate system," implying 
that relevant data, processed for the purpose of 
providing the telecommunication concerned, is erased 
immediately after the communication is terminated. 
Donner said the Council therefore went for another 
option and tasked its preparatory bodies to work on 
a proposal requiring service providers to retain 
relevant data defined in a common list.  Donner said 
the proposal would bear in mind a requirement of 
"proportionality" of the measure in relation to 
costs, data protection and efficiency. 
 
EUROPEAN EVIDENCE WARRANT: PROGRESS REPORT 
------------------------------------------ 
10.  The Council noted a progress report concerning 
negotiations on a draft Framework Decision on the 
European Evidence Warrant (EEW) for obtaining 
objects, documents and data for use in proceedings 
in criminal matters.  The proposal was designed as a 
first step toward a single mutual recognition 
instrument that would in due course replace all 
existing mutual assistance regimes. 
 
MEASURES AGAINST SHIP-SOURCE POLLUTION 
-------------------------------------- 
11.  The Greek, Cypriot and Maltese delegations 
continued to block adoption of a draft Framework 
Decision to strengthen the criminal law framework 
for the enforcement of the law against ship-source 
pollution.  Donner said the Presidency would 
continue to work on a compromise solution with the 
hope of reaching agreement by the year's end. 
 
MCKINLEY