H.LABAYLE, R.MEHDI : Terrorisme : le jour d’après

Original Published HERE

<strong>par Henri Labayle et Rostane Mehdi</strong>

(ENGLISH ABSTRACT by C.Perinaud:
The day after
Beyond disgust and emotion, the tragic events that which took place in Paris on 7 January 2014 lead us to think about the place of law in our contemporary societies. One can only be shocked by the inability of the latest to tackle the increasing number of murders driven by fanatism and religious obscurantism.
What strikes in the attack of CharlieHebdo is the position of the victims; journalists, satirical cartoonists and the policemen who were in charge of protecting them. Yet, according to the ECtHR formula the murder aimed at killing the “public watchdog of the democracy” . Who will protect us from hated and intolerant speech tomorrow?
Yesterday
The events that which arose in Paris are unfortunately only exceptional because of their extent. For 25 years, Salman Rushdie has been frightened by those who condemned him.
For almost 10 years, Danish cartoonists from the Jyllands-Posten have been placed under the police protection.
We need to think about it. If we need to talk about a “civilisation war”, it can’t be a religious one or a mere irreducible opposition between Occident and Islam. If there is a war, it can only be a fight for the Rule of law.
Tomorrow
The answer to those events is the criminal law so as to reduce the killers to what they are and what they have never ceased to be: criminals. To read things from another prospective would be to acknowledge acknowledging that the fight they intend to conduct can be qualified as such. But it cannot because it is only a crime.
Yet, the collapse of the Rule of law is obvious as it is unable to provide for an efficient answer to the terrorist threat. What strikes the observer of the area of Freedom Security and Justice is indeed the growing number of those criminal actions and the difficulties faced by democratic societies to overcome them.)

TEXT OF THE ORIGINAL POST

Les assassinats commis au journal Charlie Hebdo ne nous sont pas étrangers. Ni le citoyen, ni le juriste, ni l’observateur des développements de l’Espace de liberté, sécurité et de justice ne peuvent y être indifférents. Ils nous invitent, par delà le dégoût et l’émotion, à réfléchir aux grands équilibres de nos sociétés contemporaines et à la place que le droit peut y tenir.

On ne peut qu’être surpris et anéantis devant le spectacle, au XXI° siècle, d’une société occidentale incapable d’interrompre la chronique inexorable de meurtres annoncés par le fanatisme et l’obscurantisme religieux, chaînon supplémentaire à l’abomination quotidienne qui ensanglante le Proche Orient.

Ce qui frappe ici d’abord et nous touche au plus profond, sont les victimes. Journalistes, caricaturistes, policiers les protégeant sont tombés sous les balles de criminels ayant juré leur perte en raison de caricatures jugées offensantes pour la religion musulmane. Aussi, par delà les débats de principe relatifs à la liberté de la presse et à la liberté d’opinion, il est bon, peut-être de rappeler aujourd’hui ce qu’en dit la Cour européenne des droits de l’Homme, dans une formule magnifique : la presse est le « chien de garde de la démocratie » (CEDH, 25 juin 1992, Thorgeir Thorgeirson c. Islande, req. n° 13778/88).

Le meurtre de la rédaction de Charlie Hebdo n’est autre que celui des chiens de garde de nos démocraties. Il nous renvoie à cette interrogation simple : qui nous protégera, demain, des discours de haine et d’intolérance qui ont armé le bras des assassins ?

A la condamnation de ceux là, la Cour européenne des droits de l’Homme participe aussi lorsqu’elle affirme haut et clair que « la tolérance et le respect de l’égale dignité de tous les êtres humains constituent le fondement d’une société démocratique et pluraliste. Il en résulte qu’en principe on peut juger nécessaire, dans les sociétés démocratiques, de sanctionner voire de prévenir toutes les formes d’expression qui propagent, incitent à, promeuvent ou justifient la haine fondée sur l’intolérance (y compris l’intolérance religieuse), si l’on veille à ce que les « formalités », « conditions », « restrictions » ou « sanctions » imposées soient proportionnées au but légitime poursuivi » (CEDH, 2 juillet 2006, Erbakan c. Turquie, req. 59405/00).

C’est bien ainsi qu’il nous faut percevoir les évènements parisiens d’hier, qui ne sont exceptionnels malheureusement que par leur ampleur.

Hier

Voici près d’un quart de siècle que Salman Rushdie est poursuivi par la vindicte imbécile de ceux qui l’avaient condamné, que son traducteur japonais puis son éditeur ont été victimes de leur proximité avec l’auteur des Versets sataniques. Voici près de dix ans que les dessinateurs danois du Jyllands-Posten, pour des faits exactement similaires à ceux reprochés à Charlie Hebdo, sont placés sous protection policière.

Y réfléchir est nécessaire. A l’instar de l’historicisme, l’approche consistant à faire de la culture le fondement exclusif du droit mène peu ou prou au relativisme. Or, la ligne suivie par les islamistes est bien celle-là : dans le domaine des droits de l’homme les particularités spirituelles ou culturelles y légitiment, en le systématisant, le rejet de principes généralement considérés comme universels. Dans cette perspective, les droits fondamentaux plongent leurs racines « dans la conviction que Dieu, et Dieu seul, est l’Auteur de la Loi et Source de tous les droits de l’homme » (Introduction, al. 2, Déclaration islamique universelle des droits de l’homme).

Se dessinent ainsi les contours d’un univers dans lequel l’homme n’est pas détenteur de prérogatives inhérentes à sa nature mais redevable à une volonté divine dont tout procède. La prégnance des préceptes religieux est ici absolue, car ils étalonnent (en réalité, ils vident de leur substance) tous les droits et libertés énoncés. Ainsi, même lorsqu’il est expressément reconnu, le droit à la liberté religieuse et donc par extension les droits qui en dérivent ne peuvent s’exercer que dans les limites imposées par la Loi de Dieu (Article 13 de la DIUDH qui doit être lu à la lumière des dispositions de l’article 2). Pour les islamistes, l’attribution de droits s’effectue exclusivement par référence à une appartenance religieuse et selon un raisonnement substantiellement discriminatoire. En effet, toute cette construction repose sur l’idée centrale que les hommes devront être distingués sur la base de leur religion et soumis de ce fait même à des régimes que l’on sait différenciés.

Cette démarche vise à rompre avec un unanimisme factice (du moins au yeux des islamistes), le but recherché étant d’assurer l’intégrité d’un système de valeurs définitivement inconciliables avec les prescriptions universelles notamment en ce qu’elles concernent les droits de la femme, la liberté de conscience ou les peines pénales cruelles et inhumaines. Elle revient à dénier toute pertinence au prolongement moderne le plus remarquable de ces philosophies humanistes en vertu desquelles le respect des droits de l’homme ne résulte que des exigences de la raison humaine.

Par delà les discours convenus et les tentatives de récupération politique auxquels, déjà, la société médiatique se prête, une réflexion s’impose alors quant à la « guerre » de civilisation à laquelle Régis Debray se référait aujourd’hui, sur France Culture. Elle est tout sauf une guerre de religions comme d’aucuns s’empressent de nous le suggérer, un affrontement entre l’Occident et l’Islam, une opposition de nature complaisamment mise en scène par des amateurs de lumière médiatique.

S’il faut employer un vocabulaire belliciste, mieux vaut être conscient de sa portée tant l’utilisation de ces postures a conduit loin, trop loin, outre-Atlantique comme la publication expurgée d’un rapport de la CIA par le Sénat américain le mois dernier en atteste. Si guerre il y a, elle est tout simplement une guerre entre l’Etat de droit et l’Etat de non-droit.

Demain

La réponse par le droit est donc la seule qui vaille, et par un droit pénal ramenant les coupables à ce qu’ils sont et non jamais cessé d’être : des criminels. Parler autrement serait reconnaître que le combat qu’ils prétendent mener en est un. Il n’est que crime. Il est d’ailleurs vraisemblable que les brillantes analyses visant à leur prêter une stratégie réfléchie et le projet d’opposer les communautés n’est qu’illusion. Animés de leur volonté de vengeance et sûrs de leur bon droit, ils n’ont sans doute voulu qu’une seule chose : punir et tuer. Qu’en revanche, en amont, le conditionnement des esprits et, en aval, la réalisation du crime aient nécessité l’appui d’une organisation va de soi.
Or la faillite du droit est ici manifeste.
Empilant les législations d’exception les unes sur les autres, sans grands états d’âme du législateur, l’Etat de droit n’apporte aujourd’hui aucune réponse véritablement efficace à la menace, la criminalité terroriste empruntant des formes et des calendriers auxquels l’action policière peine à s’adapter, faute de moyens parfois et parce que les limites du droit l’imposent, souvent.
En l’espèce, la rapidité de la réponse policière ne masquera pas longtemps qu’elle n’est que réaction, qui plus est à propos de Pieds Nickelés de l’horreur oubliant leur carte d’identité dans leur véhicule. Là encore les polémiques habituelles s’en nourriront. Pourtant, en démocratie, c’est ainsi que la loi le commande et c’est bien là que les difficultés se multiplient, en France et en Europe.
Car ce qui frappe, dans l’observation de l’Espace de liberté, sécurité et justice, est bien la généralisation de cette forme d’action criminelle et la difficulté des Etats démocratiques à y répondre. Rapidement classée dans nos esprits au rang des faits divers, la tuerie aveugle du Musée juif de Bruxelles doit davantage l’arrestation de son auteur au hasard qu’à l’efficacité de la loi pénale et ce, après que l’affaire Merah ait pourtant frappé les esprits et provoqué des remises en question.
C’est dire qu’agir en amont est essentiel en la matière, ce dont l’Union européenne a pris conscience au cours de l’année 2014, suivant en cela l’impulsion du Coordinateur de la lutte anti-terroriste. Outre l’identification et le suivi des individus concernés, le stockage des données les concernant, la prévention et la lutte contre la radicalisation terroriste sont ainsi devenus des priorités, en lien avec le dossier des djihadistes européens partant combattre au Proche Orient. Merah, Nemmouche et peut être l’un des suspects du carnage de Charlie Hebdo n’en faisaient-ils pas partie ?
Ainsi, la guerre des idées est venue progressivement s’imposer à l’esprit d’une société qui était largement restée indifférente à cette dimension particulière.
Car c’est vraisemblablement là qu’est le nœud du problème.
Dans une société européenne largement sécularisée où parfois, comme en France, la laïcité est érigée en principe commandant la neutralité de la chose publique, l’irruption du fait religieux n’a pas été perçue à sa juste mesure, en particulier mais pas seulement à propos de l’Islam.
Religion d’implantation relativement nouvelle en France, sinon en Europe, son insertion et son adaptation à la société occidentale n’ont fait l’objet d’aucune attention particulière, d’aucun accompagnement, d’aucune pédagogie réciproque.

Permettant que soit mis l’accent sur ce qui singularise et sépare et non sur ce qui rassemble le corps social, la démocratie libérale a ainsi autorisé sans s’en rendre compte que la place publique devienne le siège de débats récurrents, de la burka aux menus des cantines en passant par les prières de rue, dont les solutions en forme de compromis ont donné à chacun le sentiment qu’il en était le perdant. Confessionnalisation des principes et communautarisation des démarches n’ont sans doute pas suscité l’attention méritée, fait mesurer les risques encourus.

A cette incapacité à dégager des lignes claires de vie en commun s’est ajoutée le spectacle d’un théâtre extérieur où la multiplication des interventions occidentales au Proche Orient puis en Afrique subsaharienne a fini par donner l’impression d’une planification organisée.
L’irrationnel et le fanatisme ont alors enclenché le processus de victimisation et de vengeance. Il conduit à la journée d’hier tandis que l’instrumentalisation de cette violence, de part et d’autre, ouvre le risque de voir se creuser les fossés.

Edgar Morin l’écrit très bien dans le Monde de ce jour : « la pensée réductrice triomphe. Non seulement les fanatiques meurtriers croient combattre les croisés et leurs alliés les juifs (que les croisés massacraient), mais les islamophobes réduisent l’arabe à sa supposée croyance, l’islam, réduisent l’islamique en islamiste, l’islamiste en intégriste, l’intégriste en terroriste».

Lutter contre cette réduction demande donc de changer de logiciel. N’est pas Saint Just qui veut pour réclamer « pas de liberté pour les ennemis de la liberté » mais là est bien l’interrogation qui va dominer le débat politique dans les jours qui viennent.

J.P. Jacqué : L’AVIS 2/13 CJUE. Non à l’adhésion à la Convention européenne des droits de l’homme ?

par Jean Paul Jacqué

Original published HERE

L’avis 2/13 de la Cour de justice ne peut manquer de susciter la surprise, voir pour certains la réprobation. Saisie par la Commission de l’accord d’adhésion de l’Union à la Convention européenne des droits de l’homme, la Cour constate que cet accord est incompatible avec les traités. Pour la seconde fois, la Cour de justice bloque la voie de l’adhésion. Dans son avis 2/94, la Cour avait estimé que la Communauté ne disposait pas au titre de l’article 235 CE (aujourd’hui 352 TFUE) de la compétence nécessaire pour adhérer à la Convention. Les implications institutionnelles d’une telle opération exigeaient une révision des traités. Celle-ci fut opérée par le traité de Lisbonne dont l’article 6, paragraphe 2, TUE, impose à l’Union d’adhérer à la Convention. L’adhésion a fait l’objet de longues négociations dans le cadre du Conseil de l’Europe avec les Hautes Parties contractantes à la Convention et l’accord qui résultait de celles-ci a été soumis par la Commission à la Cour de justice en application de l’article 218, paragraphe 11, TFUE, afin que celle-ci se prononce sur la compatibilité de l’accord envisagé avec les traités, un avis négatif imposant, soit la révision des traités, soit la renégociation de l’accord. Or tel est le cas puisque dans son avis 2/13 du 18 décembre 2014 rendu en Assemblée plénière, la Cour constate l’incompatibilité de l’accord avec l’article 6, paragraphe 2, TUE et le protocole n°8 relatif à l’article 6, paragraphe 2.

La surprise vient du fait que la Cour s’était exprimée à deux reprises sur la question avant l’ouverture des négociations, notamment en pré-négociant avec la Cour européennes des droits de l’homme, posant des conditions que les négociateurs avaient pris soin de respecteret qu’elle avait suivi avec attention le déroulement de la négociation. Elle vient aussi du fait que la Cour s’oppose aux vingt-huit Etats membres qui soutenaient unanimement le projet d’accord.

Il faut se garder de toute appréciation rapide qui conduirait à penser que la Cour exprime au fond dans cet avis un refus définitif de l’adhésion parce que celle-ci porterait atteinte à son pouvoir exclusif de statuer sur les droits fondamentaux dans l’Union européenne. Une décision judiciaire ne peut être analysée sur la base d’intentions politiques supposées du juge. Il convient avant tout d’examiner avec soin le raisonnement suivi et d’en apprécier les conséquences. En effet, on ne saurait reprocher à la Cour de vouloir préserver les spécificités de l’ordre juridique de l’Union, d’autant plus que le protocole n°8 relatif à l’article 6 l’invitait à suivre cette voie.

Le challenge présenté par l’adhésion n’est pas facile à remporter. La Convention européenne des droits de l’homme est à l’origine un traité interétatique auquel on se propose de faire adhérer une entité de nature fédérale qui n’est certes pas un Etat.

Aussi une système qui s’applique sans difficultés aux parties contractantes étatiques risque s’il est plaqué sans précautions sur l’Union européenne de dénaturer profondément celle-ci. Tout l’enjeu de la négociation consistait à traiter autant que possible l’Union comme un Etat en ce qui concernait les aspects institutionnels (nomination des juges, participation au Comité des Ministres … ) tout en identifiant les points sur lesquels des adaptations étaient indispensables. Il faut saluer l’effort des négociateurs qui ont identifié les problèmes et tenté de les résoudre, même si la Cour de justice estime que leur effort s’est arrêté en chemin et que le résultat est insuffisant. Mais l’ensemble des points évoqués par la Cour a été identifié et traité au cours des discussions. Continue reading “J.P. Jacqué : L’AVIS 2/13 CJUE. Non à l’adhésion à la Convention européenne des droits de l’homme ?”

La guerre des juges n’aura pas lieu. Tant mieux ? Libres propos sur l’avis 2/13 de la Cour de justice relatif à l’adhésion de l’Union à la CEDH

Original published HERE (emphasis added)

par Henri Labayle, CDRE

Il était attendu par beaucoup, craint par certains, espéré par d’autres. L’avis 2/13 de la Cour de justice rendu le 18 décembre 2014 à propos de l’adhésion de l’Union européenne à la Convention européenne des droits de l’Homme est, en définitive, un avis négatif. Le projet d’accord d’adhésion y est, en effet, jugé comme n’étant ni « compatible avec l’article 6 §2 TUE ni avec le protocole n° 8 relatif à l’article 6 §2 du TUE » relatif à l’adhésion de l’UE à la CEDH. En l’état donc, la cohabitation des deux Cours suprêmes européennes au sein d’un même système juridictionnel de garantie des droits fondamentaux est exclue, à l’inverse de ce que la lettre du traité sur l’Union européenne laissait envisager et que les amateurs de rapports de système escomptaient. Avant de s’interroger sur les conséquences de cet avis faisant obstacle à l’adhésion de l’UE à la CEDH, il est bon d’en rappeler le contexte.

1. Contexte

Les relations entre le droit de l’Union et le droit de la CEDH ne sont devenues problématiques que récemment. Longtemps en effet, le silence des traités constitutifs sur la question de la protection des droits fondamentaux a été comblé par des expédients connus de tous. Volontarisme de la Cour de justice et réserve de la Cour européenne des droits de l’Homme ont ainsi permis au juge de Strasbourg et de Luxembourg d’assurer tant bien que mal une cohérence minimale dans la garantie des droits fondamentaux en Europe.

La question n’était pas que de principe. Si, dans un premier temps, la primauté du droit communautaire en fut implicitement l’enjeu, puisque les Cours suprêmes allemandes et italiennes faisait de cette protection des droits fondamentaux dans l’univers communautaire une condition de leur ralliement, ce dernier fut rapidement dépassé, posant de ce fait et qu’on le veuille ou non des problèmes de préséance.

Car, et cela est rarement mis en relief, la position des Etats membres de l’Union, par ailleurs Etats parties à la Convention européenne des droits de l’Homme, est inconfortable par nature puisque la Communauté, hier, comme l’Union aujourd’hui ne sont pas parties à la CEDH. Elle est même devenue progressivement intenable.

La première explication de cette tension nouvelle tient tout simplement à l’élargissement inéluctable des compétences de l’Union. Non pas que les droits fondamentaux soient devenus en eux-mêmes une compétence de l’Union, comme Jean Paul Jacqué a eu maintes fois l’occasion d’en faire la démonstration, mais parce que les nouvelles compétences de l’Union l’ont conduite directement sur le terrain d’exercice de ces droits fondamentaux. A cet égard, la constitution d’un Espace de liberté, sécurité et justice a marqué une irruption directe de l’Union dans le champ des droits fondamentaux, posant ainsi aux Etats membres en charge de l’exécution des politiques migratoires ou sécuritaires des questions redoutables. Des formes et des limites de la lutte contre le terrorisme à l’obligation de secourir les migrants, les occasions de ne plus esquiver le débat se sont multipliées. Les raisons d’un raidissement aussi.

D’autant que la montée en puissance de la protection juridictionnelle des droits fondamentaux au plan européen a mis les Etats membres en situation de devoir, parfois et en cas de contradiction, choisir entre leurs obligations communautaires et leurs devoirs conventionnels.

La tolérance longtemps manifestée par la Cour européenne des droits de l’Homme, des arrêts Cantoni à l’affaire Matthews c. Royaume Uni a donc pris fin avec la jurisprudence fameuse Bosphorus et l’apparition de la doctrine dite de la « protection équivalente ».

En un mot, pour prix de son indifférence, la Cour de Strasbourg y a marqué les limites de sa compréhension dans un paragraphe 156 qui mérite la citation intégrale : pour « que l’organisation offre semblable protection équivalente, il y a lieu de présumer qu’un Etat respecte les exigences de la Convention lorsqu’il ne fait qu’exécuter des obligations juridiques résultant de son adhésion à l’organisation. Pareille présomption peut toutefois être renversée dans le cadre d’une affaire donnée si l’on estime que la protection des droits garantis par la Convention était entachée d’une insuffisance manifeste. Dans un tel cas, le rôle de la Convention en tant qu’« instrument constitutionnel de l’ordre public européen » dans le domaine des droits de l’homme l’emporterait sur l’intérêt de la coopération internationale (Loizidou c. Turquie (exceptions préliminaires), arrêt du 23 mars 1995, série A no 310, pp. 27-28, § 75) ».

Le reste n’est plus que conséquences.

Continue reading “La guerre des juges n’aura pas lieu. Tant mieux ? Libres propos sur l’avis 2/13 de la Cour de justice relatif à l’adhésion de l’Union à la CEDH”

Steve PEERS :The CJEU and the EU’s accession to the ECHR: a clear and present danger to human rights protection

Original published HERE
18 December 2014

At long last, the CJEU has today delivered its ruling regarding the EU’s accession to the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). It’s a complex judgment that raises many legal questions. For now, this post seeks to provide: a summary of the ruling; an assessment of the consequences of the ruling; and an initial critique of the Court’s reasoning. On the latter point, the Court’s ruling is fundamentally flawed. In short, the Court is seeking to protect the basic elements of EU law by disregarding the fundamental values upon which the Union was founded.

Background

Back in 1996, in Opinion 2/94, the CJEU ruled that as European Community law (as it then was) stood at that time, the EC could not accede to the ECHR. Only a Treaty amendment could overturn this judgment, and in 2009, the Treaty of Lisbon did just that, inserting a new provision in the Treaties that required the EU to accede to the ECHR (Article 6(2) TEU). That treaty also added a Protocol 8 to the Treaties, regulating aspects of the accession, as well as a Declaration requiring that accession to the ECHR must comply with the ‘specific characteristics’ of EU law.
However, these new Treaty provisions could not by themselves make the EU a contracting party to the ECHR. To obtain that outcome, it was necessary for the EU to negotiate a specific accession treaty with the Council of Europe. After a long negotiation process, this accession treaty was agreed in principle in 2013. Today’s ruling by the CJEU concerns the compatibility of that treaty with EU law.

Summary

At the outset, the CJEU ruled that the case was admissible (paras 144-52), even though the internal rules which will regulate the EU’s involvement in the ECHR have not yet been drafted. In fact, the CJEU said that these internal rules couldn’t be the subject-matter of the opinion, even if they had been drafted. The UK government had reportedly been very angry about the prospect of the CJEU considering these internal rules, so it should be satisfied on this issue.
Next, the Court made some preliminary points (paras 153-77), asserting for the first time expressly that the EU is not a state (para 156); and (in effect) that the EU system is sui generis (para 158), ie in a class by itself, without using that exact Latin phrase. Those critics of the EU who consider it to be a State, and those academics who dislike the sui generis concept, now have some words to eat. The Court also asserted that it was important to ensure the primacy and direct effect of EU law, referring also to the EU’s goals of ‘ever closer union’.

The Court then ruled that the draft agreement was incompatible with EU law, for five main reasons.

Firstly, it did not take account of the specific characteristics of EU law (paras 179-200), in three respects.
It did not curtail the possibility of Member States having higher human rights standards than EU law, even though the CJEU had ruled (in the Melloni judgment of 2013) that Member States could not have higher standards than the EU Charter of Rights, where the EU has fully harmonised the law. The same rule applies to the ECHR, in the Court’s view, and the draft agreement did not take account of this. Similarly, the draft agreement did not provide for the application of the rule of ‘mutual trust’ in Justice and Home Affairs (JHA) matters, which means that Member States must presume that all other Member States are ‘complying with EU law and particularly with the fundamental rights recognised by EU law’, other than in ‘exceptional circumstances’. Also, the agreement failed to rule out the possibility that when applying Protocol 16 to the Convention, which provides for national courts to send questions to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) on the interpretation of the ECHR, those national courts would ask the ECtHR to rule on EU law issues, before they asked the CJEU. This would circumvent the EU’s preliminary ruling procedure.

Secondly, the draft accession agreement violated Article 344 TFEU, which gives the CJEU monopoly on inter-state dispute settlement regarding EU law between Member States (paras 201-14), since it failed to rule out the possible use of the ECtHR to settle such disputes instead.

Thirdly, the co-respondent system set up in the draft agreement, which creates a new type of procedure where both the EU and a Member State could be parties to an ECtHR case, was incompatible with EU law for three reasons (paras 215-35). The problem with this process was that: it would give the ECtHR the power to interpret EU law when assessing the admissibility of requests to apply this process; a ruling by the ECtHR on the joint responsibility of the EU and its Member States could impinge on Member State reservations to the Convention; and the ECtHR should not have the power to allocate responsibility for breach of the ECHR between the EU and Member States, since only the CJEU can rule on EU law.

Fourth, the rules in the draft treaty on the prior involvement of CJEU before the ECtHR ruled on EU law issues were also incompatible with EU law, for two reasons (paras 236-48). They did not reserve to the EU the power to rule on whether the CJEU has already dealt with an issue, and they did not permit the CJEU to rule on the interpretation, not just the validity, of EU law.

Finally, the rules on the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) were incompatible with EU law (paras 249-57), because a non-EU court cannot be given the power of judicial review over EU acts, even though the CJEU has no such jurisdiction itself as regards most CFSP issues.

Consequences Continue reading “Steve PEERS :The CJEU and the EU’s accession to the ECHR: a clear and present danger to human rights protection”

National security and secret evidence in legislation and before the courts: exploring the challenges

FULL STUDY DOWNLOADABLE HERE
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This Study examines the way in which justice systems across a selection of EU Member States use and rely on intelligence information that is kept secret and not disclosed to the defendants and judicial authorities in the name of national security.
It analyses the laws and practices in place from the perspective of their multifaceted impact on the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights (in particular its provisions related to the rights of the defence and freedom of information and expression), as well as on wider ‘rule of law’ principles. The analysis is based on a comparative study of the legal regimes, interpretations by domestic and European tribunals as well as key developments and contemporary practices concerning the use of intelligence information as ‘evidence’ and the classification of information as ‘state secrets’ during trials in the name of ‘national security’ in the following seven EU Member States (EUMS): the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands and Sweden.

The examination has highlighted a number of key research findings.

It first shows a wide variety of national legal systems and judicial practices embedded in domestic historical, political and constitutional trajectories characterising each Member State jurisdiction (see Section 1 of the Study and Annex 5 with detailed Country Fiches).
The United Kingdom and the Netherlands are the only two Member States examined with official legislation allowing for the formal use of classified intelligence information in judicial proceedings. The United Kingdom constitutes an ‘exception’ in the broader EU landscape due to the existence of the much-contested ‘Closed Material Procedures’ (CMPs) – secret court hearings where only the judge and security-cleared special advocates are given access to sensitive intelligence material. The Netherlands operates a system of ‘shielded witnesses’ in courts, allowing intelligence officials to be heard before a special examining magistrate (Sections 1.1. and 1.2 of this Study). Other EUMS analysed (Germany, Spain and Sweden) present indirect judicial practices in which certain evidence may be hidden from a party during trials under a number of conditions (Section 1.3).

Nevertheless, the Study demonstrates that secret evidence is not always legal evidence. In countries such as Germany, Italy or Spain the rights of the defence and the right to a fair trial cannot be ‘balanced’ against national security or state interests as this would directly contravene their respective constitutional frameworks (Section 1.4).

Yet, all EUMS under examination face a number of challenges as regards the difficult and often controversial declassification or disclosure of intelligence materials, which too often lacks proper independent judicial oversight and allows for a disproportionate margin of appreciation by state authorities (Section 1.5 of this Study).

Another issue resulting from the comparative investigation relates to the fuzziness and legal uncertainties inherent to the very term ‘national security’ (as evidenced in Section 1.6 and Annex 3).
While this notion is quite regularly part of political and legal debates in EU and national arenas, the Study reveals that a proper definition of what national security actually means is lacking across a majority of EUMS under investigation.
The few definitional features that appear in EUMS’ legal regimes and doctrinal practices fail to meet legal certainty and ‘rule of law’ standards, such as the “in accordance with the law” test (see below). This too often leads to a disproportionate degree of appreciation for the executive and over-protection from independent judicial oversight, which is further exacerbated in a context where some EUMS have bilateral systems of mutual respect of state secrets with third countries such as the US.
Moreover, the disparities and heterogeneous legal protection regimes among EUMS also mean that EU citizens who are suspects in judicial procedures are protected differently or to divergent degrees across the EU. There are variable ‘areas of justice’ in the EU when it comes to the rights of defence of suspects in cases dealing with national security and state secrets. This diversity is at odds with the ambition of developing a common AFSJ and achieving non discrimination between EU nationals when it comes to the delivery of fundamental rights.

A second key finding of the Study relates to a growing transnational exchange of intelligence and use of these intelligence materials before courts (as developed in Section 2 and Annex 1 of this Study).

The 2013 Snowden revelations provide the general context within which EUMS’ regimes and practices need to be analysed. There has been a growing expansion of intelligence cooperation across the world, which is mainly transatlantic and asymmetrical in nature due to the more prominent role played by the US.
This has strengthened the view that transnational threats require a more extensive sharing of raw data on individuals collected by internet or mobile devices. This trend poses a number of dilemmas from the perspective of judicial accountably and the rule of law (Section 2.1 of this Study). One relates to the difficulties in assessing the quality, lawfulness and accuracy of the information, and the extent to which this very information can be considered ‘evidence’ in trials (Section 2.2). The current reliance on intelligence information is, moreover, problematic in light of insufficient or deferential judicial oversight of executive decisions taken ‘in the name of national security’.
This is particularly also the case in respect of the ways in which the use of state secrets can disrupt government officials’ accountability in cases of alleged ‘wrongdoing’ (Section 2.3).

A third finding concerns an emerging set of European judicial standards from the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) on issues related to intelligence information, national security and state secrets, in particular when these affect the rights of the defence (refer to Section 3, Annex 1 and Annex 2 of this Study).

One of the most important legal standards when assessing national security and intelligence information is the “in accordance with the law” principle. Continue reading “National security and secret evidence in legislation and before the courts: exploring the challenges”

LGBTI ASYLUM-SEEKERS: THE CJEU SENDS MIXED MESSAGES

by Professor Steve Peers

ORIGINAL PUBLISHED HERE

Many countries worldwide still impose severe criminal sanctions and other forms of ill treatment on people who are gay, lesbian, transgender or intersex (LGBTI). Fortunately, according to the CJEU, any non – EU citizen suffering persecution on grounds of sexual orientation can seek asylum in the EU, claiming that they are part of a ‘particular social group’ being persecuted, in accordance with the EU’s qualification Directive.

The Court’s prior case-law (the X, Y and Z judgment of 2013) further clarifies that they do not have to keep their sexuality hidden in their country of origin in order to claim refugee status. But the mere existence of criminal law prohibitions in the country of origin doesn’t necessarily mean that LGBTI asylum-seekers are being persecuted: the crucial question is whether such laws are actually being enforced.

Before getting to the issue of persecution, though, how can the authorities check whether asylum-seekers are gay or lesbian in the first place? In today’s judgment in A, B and C, the CJEU rules out the most obnoxious forms of procedures to determine sexual orientation, but still leaves some leeway for dubious behaviour by national authorities.

The judgment

Asked by a Dutch court to clarify what national authorities can do to establish the sexual orientation of asylum seekers, the CJEU begins by stating that a mere self declaration by the asylum seeker is not sufficient. This is only the starting point of the assessment.

Although EU legislation does not address the issue of the credibility of asylum seekers in much detail, the CJEU states that the process of determining credibility must be consistent with the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. In principle, the same rules apply to all categories of asylum seekers, but they can be adapted to particular groups.

First of all, the CJEU states that questions ‘based on stereotypical notions may be useful’ to national authorities. But they cannot base their decisions purely on such notions, and the asylum seeker’s inability to answer such questions cannot mean that he or she has no credibility.

Secondly, the CJEU rules against detailed questioning about asylum seekers’ sex life, on the grounds that this would breach Article 7 of the Charter (the right to privacy). (On the questions which are asked in practice, see Colin Yeo’s earlier poston the Free Movement blog).

Thirdly, the CJEU rules that LGBTI asylum-seekers should not perform sex acts, produce films of their sexual activities or undergo medical testing to prove their orientation. This would breach Article 1 of the Charter (the right to human dignity) as well as Article 7.

Finally, the CJEU rules that Member States cannot assume that LGBTI asylum-seekers lack credibility simply because they didn’t raise the issue of their sexuality as soon as possible, in light of the sensitivity of the topic. However, the Court does not rule on some additional procedural issues considered in the Opinion of the Advocate-General.

Comments

The Court’s judgment frees LGBTI asylum-seekers from many particularly obnoxious forms of testing and questioning. In particular, it frees them from phallometric testing. The Court didn’t mention the details of this process, but suffice it to say that it involves examining men’s physical reaction to viewing pornography. The judgment should have added that this process is also a breach of Article 4 of the Charter, as a form of degrading treatment.

As for producing films or engaging in sex acts, the Court was right to rule out implicitly the possible waiver of privacy rights on the grounds that other asylum-seekers would be pressured to do the same thing.

The ruling also usefully clarified that LGBTI asylum-seekers do not need to declare their sexual orientation as soon as possible. This takes account of the social reality for people who have just fled countries where their personal identity is taboo.

On the other hand, today’s judgment is unhelpful to the extent that it refers to the possibility of ‘useful stereotypes’ when questioning LGBTI asylum-seekers. Although the Court only refers in this context to questions about the existence of NGOs supporting LGBTI individuals, many other stereotypes exist. The Court ruling might be interpreted to endorse assumptions that (for instance) gay men don’t like sports, or that lesbians have short hair. Such stereotypes might be only mildly annoying on a day – to – day basis. But if they are used in order to reject an asylum claim, they could be fatal to the person concerned.

Admittedly, the Court rules out relying on the answers to such questions as the sole basis for denying asylum. Nor is it possible to decide that an asylum seeker who can’t answer such questions has no credibility. But it is still possible that an asylum seeker will lose credibility if he or she gives the ‘wrong’ answer to these questions; and those answers can form part of the assessment of credibility.

More broadly, the Court’s approach fails to take sufficient account of the wide diversity of the expression of human sexual identity, especially in countries where homosexuality is taboo.

While some questions relating to LGBTI asylum-seekers’ credibility must be acceptable, given that the Court ruled out self – declaration as an automatic route to establish such credibility, the Court could surely have found a better form of words than ‘useful stereotypes’. It could, for instance, have endorsed the relevant UNHCR guidelines discussed in the Advocate-General’s opinion.

Although there are many positive aspects of today’s judgment, the CJEU’s unjustified aversion to human rights soft law may cause problems for many LGBTI asylum-seekers in practice.

Towards a European Union legislation on presumption of innocence in criminal law

By Claire PERINAUD

(FREE Group trainee)

“The law holds that it is better that ten guilty persons escape that one innocent suffer” Sir William Blackstone, (Commentaries on the Laws of England –1760).

Foreword

For a long time, legal proceedings have been based on factual events. As far as they cannot be proven to be correct 100% of the time, judges had to use legal presumptions. Indeed, the purpose of presumptions is to distribute the burden of proof in order to give a solution to cases without clear evidence . If the parties to an adversarial case are not able to prove, presumption will prevail and the case will be decided against it[i].

The presumption of innocence, according to which one has to be considered innocent until his or her guilt can be proven by the prosecution and beyond reasonable doubts, was the answerto this need . Dating back toRoman law and originally considered as a procedural rule, the presumption of innocence became progressively the core principle of criminal proceedings[ii], as well as the ‘axiomatic and elementary’ cornerstone of the right to a fair trial[iii].

As a mark of its accession to the rank of a human right, the presumption of innocence is nowadays enshrined in different international instruments, such as at art. 11 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, at art. 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of 16 December 1966, which has been the object of the General Comment 32 by the Human rights Committee.[iv]

The presumption of innocence is also enshrined as the basis of the right to a fair trial and the right of defence of the accused or suspected by article 6 § 2 of the European Convention of Human Rights of 4 November 1950.

In the European Union, before the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty the presumption of innocence was recognised by the CJEU jurisprudence mostly in the field of competition law. The Luxembourg Court recognised that the presumption of innocence and the applicable rules of evidence, such as those concerning the burden of proof, were general principles of law, whose non-observance would amount to an error of law[v]

However, after the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty, article 48 § 1 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union is now the clear reference at primary law level to the need to respect for this principle. . It is worth noting that according to the Charter’s Explanations the right in Article 48(1) is to be given the same meaning and scope as the rights guaranteed by Article 6(2) of the ECHR, as stated by the art. 52 § 3 of the same Charter. Therefore the understanding of what presumption of innocence would mean at the EU level implies a close scrutiny to the ECHR case-law, with the possibility for EU to stem higher standards of protection.

Preparing a specific EU legislative framework for presumption of innocence Continue reading “Towards a European Union legislation on presumption of innocence in criminal law”

The End of the Transitional Period for Police and Criminal Justice Measures Adopted before the Lisbon Treaty. Who Monitors Trust in the European Justice Area?

Abstract of a study submitted to the European Parliament Civil Liberties Committee. (LIBE) THE FULL TEXT IS AVAILABLE HERE

Authors: Prof. Valsamis Mitsilegas, Head of Department of Law and Professor of European Criminal Law, Queen Mary, University of London Dr Sergio Carrera, Senior Research Fellow and Head of Justice and Home Affairs Section, Centre for European Policy Studies, CEPS Dr Katharina Eisele, Researcher, CEPS

This Study examines the legal and political implications of the forthcoming end of the transitional period, enshrined in Protocol 36 to the EU Treaties, applicable to legislative measures dealing with police and judicial cooperation in criminal matters and adopted before the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty. The analysis focuses on the meaning of the transitional period for the wider nature and fundamentals of the European Criminal Justice area and its interplay in the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (AFSJ). Particular attention is paid to its multifaceted consequences of ‘Lisbonisation’ as regards supranational legislative oversight and judicial scrutiny, not least by the European Parliament in this context, as well as its relevance at times of rethinking the relationship between the principle of mutual recognition of judicial decisions and the fundamental rights of the defence in criminal matters in the AFSJ.

Legal Framework of the Transition

The transitional provisions envisaged in Protocol 36 have limited some of the most far-reaching innovations introduced by the Treaty of Lisbon over EU cooperation in justice and home affairs (JHA) for a period of five years (1 December 2009 to 1 December 2014). Such limits include restrictions on the enforcement powers of the European Commission and of the judicial scrutiny of the Court of Justice of the European Union over legislative measures adopted in these fields before the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty under the old EU Third Pillar (Title VI of the former version of the Treaty on the European Union). Moreover, Protocol 36 provides for special ‘opt-out/opt-in’ possibilities for the UK. The scope and rules set out in Protocol 36 are of a highly complex and technical nature. The end of the transitional period enshrined in Protocol 36 reveals a complex conglomerate of legal provisions and procedures primarily designed for meeting the interest of some Member States’ governments to limit EU scrutiny, supervision and enforcement powers over national implementation and compliance with European law on police and criminal justice cooperation. This is a critical juncture because the transitional provisions of Protocol 36 come to a formal end on 1 December 2014.

Findings and Challenges

The main legal and political challenges related to the transitional provisions of Protocol 36 are multifaceted. The forthcoming end of the transitional period will only partially address the diverse legal landscape of fundamental rights protection in Europe’s area of criminal justice. The Study argues that the non-participation of the UK in EU legal instruments dealing with suspects’ rights in criminal proceedings undermines severely the effective operability of pre-Lisbon Treaty instruments driven by the mutual recognition principle, such as the European Arrest Warrant, even if from a ‘black letter’ law perspective the UK is entitled to ‘pick and choose’. In addition, the complex legal setting has contributed to creating legal uncertainty and lack of transparency characterising EU criminal justice instruments and their common applicability and implementation across the EU. The ambivalent position of the UK opens up the emergence of different and even competing areas of justice as well as dispersed levels of Europeanisation where enforcement of the principle of mutual recognition and protection of suspect rights are variable and anachronistic across the Union.

That notwithstanding, the Study argues that one of the most far-reaching consequences of the end of the transitional period will be the shifting of supervision on compliance and faithful implementation of EU law on police and criminal justice from domestic authorities in the Member States to EU institutional instances. The end of the transition will most significantly mean the liberalisation of ‘who monitors trust in the AFSJ’. This shift will for the first time ensure transnational legal, judicial and democratic accountability of Member States’ laws and practices implementing EU law in these contested areas, in particular the extent to which EU legislation is timely and duly observed by national authorities.

Protocol 36 does not foresee a formal role for the European Parliament in the decisions involved in the transition. Yet, the Parliament does have responsibility for the partly highly sensitive content of the Third Pillar measures directly affecting the citizens’ rights and freedoms and as co-legislator in post-Lisbon Treaty laws in these same domains. The lack of an effective and independent evaluation mechanism of EU criminal justice instruments based on the principle of mutual recognition poses a major challenge to legal and democratic accountability.

Protocol 36 has primarily aimed at limiting the degree of supranational (EU) legal, judicial and democratic scrutiny concerning EU Member States’ obligations in the EU Area of Justice. The legal patchwork of UK participation in pre- and post-Treaty of Lisbon criminal justice acquis indeed sends a critical signal of incoherency in the current delineation of the European Criminal Justice Area. The Study argues that the varied landscape resulting from the selective participation of the UK in EU criminal law measures poses significant challenges for legal certainty, the protection of fundamental rights in Europe’s area of criminal justice and the overall coherence of EU law.

Article 82(2) TFEU grants express EU competence to legislate on rights of the defence in criminal procedures where necessary to facilitate the operation of the principle of mutual recognition in criminal matters. The legality of post-Lisbon legislation on defence rights is thus inextricably linked with the effective operation of mutual recognition in criminal matters, including of the Framework Decision on the European Arrest Warrant. This is supported by pertinent case law of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), which ruled against previous UK requests to participate in the Visa Information System, or the Frontex and biometrics regulations on the basis of a teleological and contextual approach focusing on the coherence of EU law.

The Study argues that defence rights should not be negotiable at the expense of citizens’ and residents’ rights and freedoms. There is a direct causal link under EU primary law between the adoption of EU defence rights measures and the effective operation of mutual recognition enforcement instruments. Differing levels of EU Member State commitment to and participation in the fundamental rights of individuals in criminal proceedings run counter to a teleological approach which respects fully the objectives and the integrated nature of the AFSJ.

Recommendations

Increasing Coherency and Practical Operability: Suspects Rights as Sine qua non

The transition envisaged in Protocol 36 may well lead to incoherency and practical inoperability of the European Criminal Justice Area. The European Parliament as co-legislator in EU criminal justice law has an active role to play at times of ensuring that a common understanding of ‘ensuring coherency’ and ‘practical operability’ of the EU AFSJ is firmly anchored on strong defence rights and fair trial protection (rights of suspected or accused persons) and a sound rule of law-compliant (on-theground) implementation across the domestic justice arenas of EU Member States.

Promoting Consolidation and Codification — Better Linking of Mutual Recognition and Rights of Suspects in Criminal Proceedings

The European Parliament should give priority at times of implementing previous inter-institutional calls for consolidation and even codification of existing EU rules and instruments dealing with judicial cooperation in criminal matters. The new LIBE Committee should follow up the calls outlined in the European Parliament Report with recommendations to the Commission on the review of the European Arrest Warrant (2013/2109(INL). This should go along with the full accomplishment of the EU Roadmap of suspects’ rights in criminal proceedings as well as the procedural rights package.

Implementation and Evaluation — A Stronger Democratic Accountability

The European Parliament should give particular priority to better ensuring Member States’ timely and effective implementation of pre- and post-Lisbon Treaty European criminal law. An effective and independent evaluation mechanism should be developed following the template provided by the new 2013 Schengen Evaluation Mechanism, in which the European Parliament has played a role in the decision-making and implementation. This template should be followed at times of implementing any future system for criminal justice cooperation.

The Study starts by situating the discussion and briefly explaining the material scope and particulars featuring the transitional period in Protocol 36 in Section 2. Section 3 then moves into locating the debate in the specific context of the UK, and outlining its casuistic or privileged position in respect of the expansion of `supranationalism’ over EU police and criminal justice cooperation. Section 4 identifies a number of cross-cutting dilemmas and challenges affecting the transitional period, in particular those related to the impact of activating the Commission and Luxembourg Court’s legal and judicial scrutiny powers, questions of incoherencies due to UK’s variable participation and the obstacles to practical operability. Section 5 lays down three potential scenarios for the way forward in what concerns issues of fragmentation and coherence, reforming old EU Third Pillar law and the EAW while ensuring their added value, and questions related to implementation, consolidation and codification of EU criminal law. Section 6 offers some conclusions and puts forward a set of policy suggestions to the European Parliament and its LIBE Committee.

Towards a Declaration of Internet Rights

by Professor Stefano RODOTA’ (FREE Group member) (*)

For many years there has been a wide discussion about the possibility of adopting an Internet Bill of Rights, and debates have produced a considerable number of proposals. The Berkman Centre at Harvard University counted 87 of such proposals, to which we can add the Internet Magna Charta that Tim Berners-Lee is working on, and lastly the Declaration of the Rights of Internet Rights that has been drafted by a Committee established by the President of the Italian Chamber of Deputies. The novelty of the latter is that for the first time the proposal of an Internet Bill of Rights has not been produced by scholars, associations, dynamic coalitions, enterprises, or groups of stakeholders, but by an institutional entity.

It is necessary to recall that the debate on this topic dates back to the World Summit on the Information Society organised in 2005 by the UN in Tunis, where the need for an International Convention on Internet rights was explicitly underlined. This subject was deepened in the following UN Internet Governance Forums. But the international debate was progressively turned into precise rules within the European Union, even before the issue of the Internet Bill of Rights appeared in the international arena. These are not, however, parallel situationsdestined not to meet at any point. The European Union progressively brought to light the constitutional basis of the protection of personal data, finding its full recognition in Article 8 (**) of its Charter of Fundamental Rights. Here a strong similarity with the Internet Bill of Rights is identified, and it concerns precisely the constitutional scope of rules.

We are going through a phase of deep change in the way in which we are facing the problems highlighted by the Internet dynamics, in the passage from Web 1.0 to Web 2.0 and now to Web 3.0. It is not just a matter of following technological changes by adjusting legal provisions to suit them. A new definition is being developed of the rationale driving actions in this area, through a radical U-turn as regards the dynamics of the latest phase. A possible historical turning point is ahead of us, whose/that’s opportunities must be seized.

It seemed that an approach had become consolidated, which left little room to rights. From Scott McNealy’s abrupt statement of 1999 – “You have zero privacy. Get over it” – up to the recent hasty conclusion by Mark Zuckerberg about the end of privacy as a “social rule”, a line characterised by the intertwining of two elements emerged: technological irresistibility and the primacy of the economic logic. On the one side, in fact, it was highlighted how technological innovations and the new social practices made it increasingly difficult, not to say impossible, the safeguard of one’s private life and of the public liberties; on the other side, the statement on the “death of privacy” had become the argument to state that personal information had to be considered as property of those who collected it.

These certainties were radically challenged by Edward Snowden’s disclosure on the magnitude of the National Security Agency’s Prism programme and by the judgements of the European Court of Justice on data retention and Google. The idea according to which the protection of fundamental rights shall give way to the interests of security agencies and enterprises was rejected.

A new hierarchy has been established, with the fundamental rights as the first and starting point. The US President had to admit the inadmissibility of the procedures provided for by the Prism program and the Court of Justice, with its decision of 8th April, that declared that the Directive on data retention was illegal. And in the Google case the same Court explicitly stated that “the fundamental rights under Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter (…) override, as a norm (…) the economic interest of the operator of the search engine”, in a perspective broadening the European Union’s jurisdiction beyond its borders.

We are faced with a true “resurrection of privacy” and, more generally, with the primacy of the need and legitimacy of rules effectively protecting the rights of Internet users. Making reference to article 8 of the Charter, the Court of Justice was acting as a true constitutional court, opening a new and wide perspective.

The Italian initiative

This is the framework within which the Italian initiative on the Declaration of Internet Rights was adopted. Its goal is not limited to having a text to be used for national debate only.

The establishment of the Committee that drafted the document, in fact, was preceded by an international conference gathering some of the authors of the Brazilian Marco Civil, the representatives of European Institutions, and several experts from different Countries.

The text drafted by the Committee was presented on 13th October during a meeting at the Chamber of Deputies with the Presidents of the Parliamentary Committees of Member Countries in charge of fundamental rights.

The present draft is now submitted to a four-month public consultation on the Internet, at the end of which the Committee will draft the final text. Such consultation, however, is also being carried out at a European and international level, as shown by the contacts with other European Parliaments and by the video conference that will be held at the beginning of December between the Italian and the French Committees. Consultations are also taking place with experts and associations from non-European Countries.

An ambitious target was set: drafting a text allowing a common international debate, accompanied by a constant monitoring by the Chamber of Deputies. The goal is not limited to working in the complex and remote perspective of an international convention. Short-term and feasible results can be achieved, concerning the strengthening of the European system, its developments and the relationships with other countries, and most of all the consolidation of a culture highlighting common dynamics in the different legal systems. In this way, the debate around a future Internet Bill of Rights may lead to the awareness that in the different legal systems several elements already exist that, once connected to one another, establish an informal Internet Bill of Rights. An evidence of such trend is found in the decisions of the Courts of the different Countries and in the choice of legislative models, as shown by the clear influence of the European model on the Brazilian Marco Civil.

The Italian Declaration is characterised by a fundamental choice. Differently from almost all the other ones, it does not contain a specific and detailed wording of the different principles and rights already stated by international documents and national Constitutions. Of course, these are generally recalled as an unavoidable reference. But the attempt of the Declaration, as a matter of fact, was to identify the specific principles and rights of the digital world, by underlining not only their peculiarities but also the way in which they generally contribute to redefining the entire sphere of rights.

The key words – besides the most well-known ones concerning the protection of personal data and the right to the informational self-determination – include access, neutrality, integrity and inviolability of IT systems and domains, mass surveillance, development of digital identity, rights and guarantees of people in Internet platforms, anonymity and right to be forgotten, interoperability, right to knowledge and education, and control over Internet governance. The importance of the needs linked to security and to the market is obviously taken into consideration, but the balancing of these interests with fundamental rights and freedoms cannot take place on equal terms, in the sense of ensuring first and foremost the full respect for rights and freedom according to the clear provisions of the Charter of Fundamental Rights and to European case law.

In particular, security needs shall not determine the establishment of a society of surveillance, control and social sorting. Economic needs are taken into consideration in the framework of the neutrality principle that, by guaranteeing the generative nature of the Internet, keeps the possibilities for innovation unchanged, and prevents strong subjects from creating conditions of exclusion of possible competitors. Furthermore, whenever Internet platforms provide public services that are essential for the life and the activities of people, it is necessary to guarantee the conditions for a suitable interoperability in compliance with the principle of competition and equal treatment of people.

Provided that not all the issues can be analysed in this document, it is suitable recalling the need to consider the access to the Internet as a fundamental right of individuals (Tim Berners-Lee compared it to the access to water), as an essential guarantee not only against any form of censorship, but also against indirect limitations, such as taxation as it is presently happening in Hungary. The set of rights recognised do not guarantee a general freedom on the Internet, but specifically aims at preventing the dependency of people from the outside, the expropriation of the right to freely develop one’s personality and identity as it may happen with the wide and increasing use of algorithms and probabilistic techniques. The autonomy in the management of personal data, therefore, shall also consider new rights as those not to be tracked and to keep silent the chip. This perspective requires a particular in-depth analysis, since a deeply interconnected society is being developed, with a passage to Internet of Things in forms that have suggested some people to speak of an Internet of Everything, which determines a digitalisation of day-to-day lives that is able to transform any person and their bodies.

People cannot be reduced to objects of external powers, they must recover the sovereignty on their digital person. Identity is a key issue. The free development of one’s personality must be safeguarded.

Starting from this set of references, it is necessary to thoroughly examine the issue of the transformation of copyright, whose analysis was postponed to the end of the consultation, since knowledge on the Internet appears as a shared asset that can be considered as a common global resource.

A broader perspective is therefore opened by the Italian draft Declaration, in consideration of the large amount of topics to be tackled and the debate between different points of view; and such Declaration is significantly in line with the European Union policy that particularly emphasises the Charter of Fundamental Rights. The unquestionable aspect is the need to fine-tune a constitutional policy for the Internet, whose users – presently amounting to three billion people – cannot rely on a freedom guaranteed by the absence of rules, as it is still presently stated.

The reality is very different, showing an interconnected network heavily regulated by private subjects that cannot be controlled and that have no democratic legitimation, as it happens – beyond any disputes – with the “Over the Top” operating on the Internet. Internet rights are denied by totalitarian regimes and, unfortunately, by democratic regimes as well. The perspective of a Declaration of Internet rights aims at developing – through procedures different from the ones of the past – the constitutional rules that are fundamental in order to allow the Internet to keep its main feature as a place of freedom and democracy, as the widest space of the history of mankind.

NOTE

(*) Intervention at the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung –FREE Group experts meeting on :
Internet: only a “single digital market” or also a space to promote fundamental rights – Towards a European “Marco Civil”? (November 12, 2014). The main idea of this experts’ conference has been to have a first look to the impact of the EU Digital Agenda on fundamental rights as framed by the Treaties, the EU Charter and the recent CJEU jurisprudence (Data retention, Google Case..). As stated by the Charter the individual should be at the center of all EU policies and this objective underpins the recent proposal for an Internet Bill Of Rights of the Italian Chamber of Deputies as well as other national examples (Brasilian “Marco Civil” and recent US initiatives at government, congress and civil society level).
Bearing in mind that EU is competent on most of the aspects dealing with Internet the question arises how to preserve and promote individual rights notably in the pending negotiations on legislative proposals notably on Data Protection, Net Neutrality and Network Security (NIS). Moreover what should be the future initiatives to be developed by the a new Commission’s legislative programme impacting on Internet ? How the future EU single digital market could preserve the principles of non-discrimination, and of informational self determination by strengthening the access to internet as a public common good ?
Together with Stefano Rodotà took also part to the Seminar
Claude Moraes Chairman of the European Parliament Civil liberties Committee (which adopted in 2009 a first Internet Bill of Rights resolution)
Jan Philipp Albrecht EP Rapporteur for the Data Protection Regulaiton and for the transatlantic “umbrella” Agreement
Paul Nemitz Director at the European Commission
Giovanni Buttarelli, Assistant European Data Protection Supervisor
Marc ROTENBERG Professor at the Georgetown University and Director of EPIC and Marie GEORGES expert at the Council of Europe
as well as Joe Mc Namee, Executive Director, European Digital Rights (EDRi).

(**) Article 8 Protection of personal data
1. Everyone has the right to the protection of personal data concerning him or her.
2. Such data must be processed fairly for specified purposes and on the basis of the consent of the person concerned or some other legitimate basis laid down by law. Everyone has the right of access to data which has been collected concerning him or her, and the right to have it rectified.
3. Compliance with these rules shall be subject to control by an independent authority

Some questions to the would-be Commissioner for Better Regulation, Fundamental Rights and Rule of Law (Timmermans)

by Steve PEERS, Henri LABAYLE and Emilio DE CAPITANI

The would-be Commissioners for Better Regulation, Fundamental Rights and Rule of Law (Timmermans) will be questioned tomorrow by Members of the European Parliament (MEPs), to determine whether the EP should vote to confirm them in office. MEPs have already asked some written questions and the would-be Commissioner have replied. However, during the oral hearing will be an opportunity for MEPs to ascertain the Commissioners’ plans, and to secure important political commitments.
Rather strangely the hearing will not follow to the EP very detailed internal rules (of art.118 and Annex XVI (*) which require that hearing should take place before the Parliamentary committees Candidate Vice President Timmermans will instead be heard by the Conference of President of political Groups.

1.Rule of law / implementation of EU law
The confidence of all EU citizens and national authorities in the functioning of the rule of law in the Member States is vital to increase the mutual trust and to further develop the EU into “an area of freedom, security and justice without internal frontiers”.
In your written reply you strongly support the recent Commission proposal for a “common rule of law framework (COM(2014)158 as repeatedly advocated by the European Parliament (but criticized by the Council legal Service). However such an exercise risk which should cover all the EU member states, risk to be meaningless if the Commission does not strengthen the mechanisms which implement the principle of sincere cooperation with and between the MS. For instance there is no ground in the Treaty which justify confidential meetings between the Commission and the MS (even in the framework of the so called “EU Pilot mechanism”) when legal certainty on the exact scope of EU citizens rights and obligations are at stake.
As first steps to strengthen the rule of law would not then be appropriate :
– to update the way how the Commission on a daily basis debates with the Member states the implementation of EU legislation?
– make public the MS implementation plans as well as the table of correspondence between EU and national rules ?
– to implement, (five years after the Lisbon Treaty !), the art.70 mechanism on “objective and impartial evaluation of the implementation of the Union policies” in the FSJA by keeping informed the European and national parliaments ?
– to take stock every year of the ruling of the European Courts and of the measures taken at national level ?

2. Charter of Fundamental rights as “roadmap for the EU legislator ?
In a recent ruling the Court of Justice stroke down for the first time an EU Directive (the Data Retention Directive 2006/24) because “.., the EU legislature has exceeded the limits imposed by compliance with the principle of proportionality in the light of Articles 7, 8 and 52(1) of the Charter. ” According to the CJEU the Directive “..does not lay down clear and precise rules governing the extent of the interference with the fundamental rights enshrined in Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter” and moreover “does not require the data in question to be retained within the European Union, with the result that it cannot be held that the control, explicitly required by Article 8(3) of the Charter, by an independent authority of compliance with the requirements of protection and security, as referred to in the two previous paragraphs, is fully ensured…” In other terms from now on the Court of Justice will require a strict assessment of the proportionality and necessity of measures that constitute serious restrictions to fundamental rights, however legitimate the objectives pursued by the EU legislature.
On the basis of this landmark ruling do you not consider your priority to revise under the proportionality perspective the legislation falling in judicial and police cooperation in criminal matters adopted before the entry into force of the Charter and of the Treaty of Lisbon ?
Will you commit to develop a stronger and more transparent strategy to deal with infringements of EU law where the rights in the Charter are threatened by a Member State’s non-existent or incorrect implemenation of its EU law obligations?
Will not be sensible, taking in account your attachment to the REFIT exercise to review the legislation by establishing “sunset clauses” for measures limiting EU citizens rights? Moreover, by sticking on data protection aspects do you not consider that this ruling raise even bigger doubts on the compatibility with the proportionality principle of the EU-US agreements on PNR and TFTP and of the legislative proposals submitted by the Commission on the EU-PNR and the “Entry-Exit” (not to speak of the lack of compliance of the proposal on trusted traveller with the principle of non discrimination) ? Continue reading “Some questions to the would-be Commissioner for Better Regulation, Fundamental Rights and Rule of Law (Timmermans)”