8. Judicial cooperation – Page 20 – European Area of Freedom Security & Justice

Twelve European countries call for a “European Protection Order” combating violence against women

This week the Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs Committee of the European Parliament will examine an interesting initiative for a Directive presented by twelve Members of the European Union (the Kingdom of Belgium, the Republic of Bulgaria, the Kingdom of Spain, the Republic of Estonia, the French Republic, the Italian Republic, the Republic of Hungary, the Republic of Poland, the Portuguese Republic, Romania, the Republic of Finland and the Kingdom of Sweden under the Spanish Presidency in accordance to the Stockholm Programme) within the framework of judicial cooperation in criminal matters.

The initiative concerns a proposal for a “European Protection Order” to ensure that the protection provided especially to women victims of violence in one Member State is maintained and continued in any other Member State to which the person moves or has moved.

The Initiative is accompanied by an explanatory memorandum allowing to appraise compliance with the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality, in accordance with Article 5 of Protocol (No 2) to the Lisbon Treaty together with a questionnaire drawn up by the Spanish Presidency on the current legislative framework in the Member States.

According to the proposal for a directive, the victim under threat should, as far as possible, enjoy the same level of protection throughout EU territory as in the State which adopted the original protection measure. The Member State to which the victim under threat moves should provide an “immediate response” in the form of a “European protection order” imposing to the “Person causing danger” one or more of the following obligations or prohibitions:

(a) an obligation not to enter certain localities, places or defined areas where the protected person resides or that he visits;

(b) an obligation to remain in a specified place, where applicable during specified times;

(d) an obligation to avoid contact with the protected person; or

(e) a prohibition on approaching the protected person closer than a prescribed distance.

Naturally, this initiative “shall not have the effect of modifying the obligation to respect fundamental rights and fundamental legal principles” as enshrined in Article 6 (article 3) of the TEU.

The European protection order is issued by a judicial authority or another competent authority only at the request of the protected person, after verifying that the protection measure meets all the requirements of the national legislation of the issuing or the requesting State.

It shall also include a summary of the facts and circumstances which have led to the imposition of the protection measure in the issuing State (if necessary with an explicit indication of a ruling on the basis of article 2 of the framework decision 2008/947/GAI or a decision concerning preventive measures on the basis of article o 4 of the framework decision 2009/829/GAI) as well as the obligations or prohibitions imposed in the protection measure underlying the European protection order on the person causing danger.

Furthermore, the length of these obligations and restrictions and the express indication that their infringement constitutes a criminal offence under the law of the issuing State or may otherwise be punishable by a deprivation of liberty should be indicated.

The proposal for a directive recognises the right by the competent authority of the executing State to refuse to recognise a European protection order in the following circumstances:

(a) the European protection order is not complete or has not been completed within the time-limit set by the competent authority of the executing State;

(b) the requirements set out in Article 2(2) have not been met;

(c) the protection derives from the execution of a penalty or measure that is covered by amnesty according to the law of the executing State and relates to an act which falls within its competence according to that law;

(d) there is immunity conferred under the law of the executing State on the person causing danger, which makes it impossible to adopt the protection measures.

The scrutiny of this initiative appears as a priority of the Spanish Presidency which, therefore, will try to obtain the European Parliament’s support in view of a swift adoption in first reading (as it happened in other cases).

If this will occur, the qualified majority in the Council will be sufficient to adopt the initiative together with the simple majority in the European Parliament.

In addition, national parliaments will be entitled to intervene to signal their opposition if they believe that the proposal does not respect the principle of subsidiarity.

Last but not least, also the European Commission will be able to express its opinion during the legislative process. However, it will not be able to tide the Council’s position as when it does when it concerns its own initiative (indeed, in these circumstances the Council may approve a proposal different from the Commission’s one only by unanimity in order to protect the right of initiative of the institution defined as the “guardian of the Treaties”).

EDC

Is the respect of minimum standard in criminal procedures utopia?

The adoption of EU legislation on procedural rights in criminal procedures is at stake since a long time and despite a number of calls from the European Parliament, no legislative instrument is yet in place.

As a consequence, suspects and defendants have no other protection than the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (ECHR) (all EU Member States are parties to the ECHR) and, after the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon, the Charter of fundamental Rights of the European Union.

Works in view of the adoption of a legal instrument in this field started in 2003 with the publication, by the European Commission, of a Green Paper.

Due to the positive feedback received, in 2004 the European Commission tabled a proposal for a framework decision to set common minimum standards for procedural safeguards (COM(2004)0328).

In 2007, after having largely watered down the Commission’s proposal without reaching any result, the Council took note of the impossibility of reaching a consensus on it. Hence, a number of Member States called to limit the application of such an instrument to cross-boarder cases or to cases in which an European Arrest Warrant (EAW) was issued.

In July 2009 the European Commission tabled a new proposal for a framework decision (COM(2009)338) on procedural rights. The proposal was extremely limited in scope covering only the rights to interpretation and translation of all “essential” documents. T

he Swedish Presidency therefore proposed the framework decision to be accompanied by a Council Resolution providing for further measures on training for interpreters and translators, accreditation/certification of interpreters and translators as well as their mandatory registration.

The Swedish Presidency presented also a draft Council Resolution on a “Roadmap” for strengthening procedural rights of suspected and accused persons in criminal proceedings.

The roadmap was adopted at the Justice and Home Affairs Council held on 23 October 2009 and a reference to it is contained in the Stockholm Programme. It covers the following measures:

A: Translation and interpretation

B: Information on rights and information about the charges

C: Legal advice and legal aid

D: Communication with relatives, employers and consular authorities

E: Special safeguards for vulnerable suspected or accused persons

F: A Green Paper on pre-trial detention .

In December 2009 the Treaty of Lisbon entered into force and all pending legislative procedures, including this one, could not come to their end.

Following to the impossibility to adopt the Framework Decision, a group of 13 Member States (BE, DE, ES, EE, FR, HU, IT, LU, AT, PT, RO, FI and SE) tabled an Initiative for the adoption of a Directive on the rights to interpretation and translation in criminal proceedings under the new legal framework provided by the Treaty of Lisbon.

The Initiative is based on the text agreed at Council level in October 2009 and will be negotiated, under the ordinary legislative procedure, under Spanish Presidency.

Will this time the EU manage to provide itself with a legal instrument ensuring to suspects and defendants minimum procedural rights in criminal proceedings?

C.G.

The EU-USA Provisional Agreement on Interbank Financial data access (SWIFT) under European Parliament scrutiny

In the next few weeks the European Parliament will receive several international agreements in the field of police and judicial cooperation negotiated or signed -albeit not yet ratified by the European Council- before the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty.

Among these, special attentions deserve the two agreements signed with the United States concerning access to personal data to fight against terrorism.

The first one concerns personal data managed by airline companies when they conclude a transport contract which has as a destination or point of transition the United States (EU-USA Agreement on access to Passenger Name Record- PNR).

The second one, recently published in the Official Journal, concerns the access to personal and financial data exchanged via interbanking messages and processed worldwide, in almost their totality, by a specific society called SWIFT .

Their access is regulated by the Terrorist Finance Tracking Program (TFTP) on the basis of which the USA Treasury Department may request via an administrative mandate (“subpoena”) to access personal and financial data to prevent and fight terrorism.

The advantage of interbanking messages relies on their fast and easy accessibility compared to financial information, whose access is regulated by the prevention programmes for combating Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing. In fact, on the basis of these measures applied worldwide, it is a bank’s responsibility to signal suspicious transactions to the National Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) which in turn transmits the information to the FIU of the countries involved in terrorist investigations.[1]

On the contrary TFTP access is direct, avoiding delays, risks of incomprehension and non-cooperative banks around the globe.

Even if available data are limited (such as clients generalities and amounts of transferred money) they become essential once they are cross-checked with information coming from other sources related to judicial, police and intelligence investigations.

This is obviously an extraordinary instrument also for the USA. This authorisation is based on exceptional powers granted to the President of the United States on a temporary basis by the Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 USC, sections 1701-1706). The President immediately used them after the 9/11 attacks and since then the Congress has renewed its authorisation every year.[2]

The TFTP programme remained secret up to 2006 when the USA press[3] published a series of articles and the Society SWIFT released a few statements after obtaining more restrictive measures to the access of data by the USA Treasury Department.

This took place despite the fact that the TFTP is exceptionally not covered by the Privacy ACT of the United States and neither by the general norms laid down to protect privacy in financial transitions.

The debate triggered at the European Union level resulted in a series of hearings and resolutions of the European Parliament[4], it set off an investigation of the CE Commission, an opinion of the data protection national authorities Working Group and an investigation carried out by the Belgian authorities ,who are the one responsible for the control of the activities carried onby the company SWIFT.

The conclusions of these discussions pointed out that the management of these data – although illegal in the EU territory- is legal in the USA territory on condition that:

-the company SWIFT adheres to the voluntary programme “SAFE HARBOR” to protect its clients[5] and

– American authorities respect a series of self-imposed limitations to limits data access; Furthermore, the constant presence of SWIFT employees when data are collected should be granted and a periodical review by an independent authority nominated in a concerted way by the USA and the EU takes place.

This complex jurisdictional construction was – and still is- based on the principle that these data are in the USA territory and therefore under jurisdiction of the American authorities.

However, things chaged when the company SWIFT restructured the systems architecture of the financial messaging network in 2007 and its global data centres. Becasue of this, SWIFT decided that the data coming from interbanking transactions outside the USA territory were all relocated exclusively within the European territory no longer allowing a mirror copy of these data in the American servers.

Based on the argument that retained data are crucial to the fight against terrorism, American authorities asked to keep on accessing these data also once they would have been relocated to the EU territory (and under EU legislation), with the guarantee that in case of a terrorist threat these data would have been transmitted back to the EU.

This ofer was mainly made on the basis that the majority of the European states are not equipped to use and process the data gathered in the TFTP. Therefore, in this way not only the United States but also the European Union would have benefit from the programme.

On the basis of this reasoning, negotiations started before summer 2009 and have been carefully followed by the European Parliament which in its resolution in September 2009 listed the minimum conditions to be applied to make sure that the use of data of TFTP is compatible with European standards. These indications refer to data protection as well as judicial protection standards, given that these are information that can be used for counter terrorism activities.

Against this background two agreements have been put forward: a first transitional agreement of the limited duration of 9 months and a second longer one whose negotiations should start in the next few weeks.

The “transitional” text of the first agreement has now been published in the Official Journal and will enter into force on 1st February 2010; it recalls some of the concerns of the European Parliament, not last the one concerning the need to anchor the implementation of this agreement to that on judicial cooperation in criminal matters between the EU and the USA concluded in Washington on 28 October 2009.[6]

It is too early to predict what the European parliament will do. One should not give for granted the outcome of the parliamentary scrutiny and its final vote since the Treaty of Lisbon (Article 16 TFEU) and the now binding Charter of Fundamental Rights[7] have introduced even stricter standard in terms of data protection.

EDC

[1] See GAFI recommendations such as the VII financial provision to gather data concerning transfer above 1.000 $ in Europe (3.000 $ in the USA) and to make them available to the authorities; see also Communitarian Directives on money laundering and Communitarian Regulations in this field (such as Regulation (CE) No 1781/2006 of the European Parliament and the Council of 15 November 2006 on information on the payer accompanying transfers of funds)

[2] CRF Presidential Executive Order 13224 issued by the President George Bush on 23 September 2001.

[3] See Wikipedia reconstruction: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorist_Finance_Tracking_Program

[4] See resolution of 6 July 2006 on the interception of bank transfer data from the SWIFT system by the US secret services (OJ C 303 E, 13.12.2006, p. 843) and Resolution of 14 February 2007 on SWIFT, the PNR agreement and the transatlantic dialogue on these issues (OJ C 287 E, 29.11.2007, p. 349).

[5] The Commission CE assessed that Safe Harbor guaranteed a sufficient level of data protection back in 2001.

[6] Processing of EU originating Personal Data by United States Treasury Department for Counter Terrorism Purposes – “SWIFT” (OJ C 166, 20.7.2007, p. 18).

[7] See also the European Convention on Human Rights, in particular Articles 5, 6, 7 and 8 thereof, the Charter of Fundamental Rights, in particular Articles 7, 8, 47, 48 and 49 thereof, Council of Europe Convention No 108 for the Protection of Individuals with regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Data, Directive 95/46/EC and Regulation (EC) No 45/2001.

Terrorism and individual freedom: after Detroit new strategies in the United States and Europe?

The speech where President Obama took full responsibility of the administration’s failure to prevent the aborted attack to the Detroit fight, confirms, if there were any doubts, the firmness and quality of the civic and political debate in the other side of the Atlantic.

By publicly recognising the administration’s liability and, more importantly, taking measures to tackle the loops the strong authority of a country that after 9/11 has made of the fight against terrorism its main priority has been confirmed.

Continue reading “Terrorism and individual freedom: after Detroit new strategies in the United States and Europe?”

Practical Cooperation in judicial matters: the Council’s priorities for the next 18 months

Regarding the horizontal issues in the field of justice, the Spanish, Belgium, and Hungarian Presidencies will prioritise the protection and promotion of fundamental rights, the protection of personal data, E-Justice and the training of judges, prosecutors and judicial staff.

Continue reading “Practical Cooperation in judicial matters: the Council’s priorities for the next 18 months”

Right to interpretation and translation in criminal proceedings: the legislative works restart

The necessity to set up common minimum standards as regard to procedural rights applying in criminal proceedings throughout the European Union was already clear for the European Parliament in 2001 when, following the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the European Union adopted a series of measures such as the European Arrest Warrant and the Framework Decision on terrorism.

However, nobody did anything in this field for several years because the European Commission as well as the Member States believed that national legislations were sufficient.

This was everything but self-evident. Indeed, the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human rights in Strasbourg as well as the increasing number of refusals to apply the European Arrest Warrant issued by a judge of another Member State, especially after the EU enlargement to 27 Member States in 2004 suggested quite the opposite.

Continue reading “Right to interpretation and translation in criminal proceedings: the legislative works restart”

Consultation on obtaining evidence in criminal matters from one Member State to another and securing its admissibility (deadline 22/01/2010)

With the launch of a recent Green Paper, The European Commission invites Member States and all concerned stakeholders to define a European strategy concerning the collection of admissible evidence in criminal matters in a cross-border context.

The Commission Communication recalls that already with the Tampere Conclusions in 1999 the European Council clearly set out the necessity to facilitate mutual trust and recognition of national decisions to overcome the obstacles derived from the differences between national legal systems and promote the fight against cross-border criminality.

Continue reading “Consultation on obtaining evidence in criminal matters from one Member State to another and securing its admissibility (deadline 22/01/2010)”

The new powers of the Court of Justice after the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty

The press release published on November 30th by the Court of Justice is worth reading by everybody interested in the European Law as well by the every individual whishing to bthe protection of its rights.
The very essential and clear text is the following:

The Treaty of Lisbon and the Court of Justice of the European Union

The Treaty of Lisbon, which was signed on 13 December 2007 by the 27 Heads of State or Government of the Member States of the Union, comes into force on 1 December 2009. It amends the two fundamental treaties – the Treaty on European Union (TEU) and the Treaty establishing the European Community, with the latter to be known in future as the ‘Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union’ (TFEU). (1)
The Treaty of Lisbon makes changes to the organisation and jurisdiction of the Court of Justice of the European Union.

Continue reading “The new powers of the Court of Justice after the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty”

New prospects for relations between the Court of Justice and national courts

Everyone knows the fundamental role of the Court of Justice in the construction of a European legal space. Indeed, thanks to its preliminary rulings which guide the work of national courts when they are called upon to enforce community law. Over the decades, the dialogue between European and national courts has ensured an increasingly faithfully interpretation of community law as well as the development of a true common legal culture.

After all, what value might have fundamental rights to stakeholders if judges are not capable to secure their correct application?

In this regard it must be recognised that the increased synergy between European and national judges (acting in this case as ‘European’ judges) together with the new powers of European Court of Justice in the area of freedom, security and justice resulted by the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon will definitely increase individual’s rights in this domain.

For example, in the field of police and judicial cooperation in criminal matters (the so-called “third pillar”), before the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty, the Court’s ability to issue preliminary rulings relied upon Member States’ discretion on the basis of Article 35 of the Treaty on European Union (*). Indeed up to the 30 November several of these Member States did not accept the Court’s competence competence.

Another example relates to the domains ‘communitarised’ in 1999 with the Treaty of Amsterdam (immigration, borders, asylum and judicial and criminal cooperation). Although in this case the situation was a bit better, Article 68 TEC (**) limited the possibility to obtain pre-trial interpretation only to judges of last appeal.

With the Treaty of Lisbon this situation has radically changed. With a Communication appeared in the Official Journal on 5 December, the European Court of Justice has published a series of apparently non-binding guidelines aimed at establishing a daily relation between national and European judges.

In this regard, the guidelines concerning the urgent preliminary ruling procedure related to the area of freedom, security and justice are particularly interesting. They state:

The procedure is governed by Article 23a of Protocol (No 3) on the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union (OJEU 2008 C 115, p. 210) and Article 104b of the Rules of Procedure of the Court of Justice. National courts may request that this procedure be applied or request the application of the accelerated procedure under the conditions laid down in Article 23a of the Protocol and Article 104a of the Rules of Procedure.”

Conditions for the application of the urgent preliminary ruling procedure

33. The urgent preliminary ruling procedure is applicable only in the areas covered by Title V of Part Three of the TFEU, which relates to the area of freedom, security and justice.

34. The Court of Justice decides whether this procedure is to be applied. Such a decision is generally taken only on a reasoned request from the referring court. Exceptionally, the Court may decide of its own motion to deal with a reference under the urgent preliminary ruling procedure, where that appears to be required.

35. The urgent preliminary ruling procedure simplifies the various stages of the proceedings before the Court, but its application entails significant constraints for the Court and for the parties and other interested persons participating in the procedure, particularly the Member States.

36. It should therefore be requested only where it is absolutely necessary for the Court to give its ruling on the reference as quickly as possible. Although it is not possible to provide an exhaustive list of such situations, particularly because of the varied and evolving nature of the rules of European Union law governing the area of freedom, security and justice, a national court or tribunal might, for example, consider submitting a request for the urgent preliminary ruling procedure to be applied in the following situations: in the case, referred to in the fourth paragraph of Article 267 TFEU, of a person in custody or deprived of his liberty, where the answer to the question raised is decisive as to the assessment of that person’s legal situation or, in proceedings concerning parental authority or custody of children, where the identity of the court having jurisdiction under European Union law depends on the answer to the question referred for a preliminary ruling.

However, it must be pointed out that these new competences will not be applied before five years in the area of police and judicial cooperation in criminal matters for acts adopted before the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon (art. 10 Protocol 36).

Also with this temporally exception it is nonetheless clear that a new phase has now started also for European judges. The interpretation of community law can now be based on an even more authority Court which in turn can rely on the Treaty and the binding Charter on Fundamental Rights binding for all the institutions, including European and national judges.

EDC

(*) EX Article 35 (TEU)
1. The Court of Justice of the European Communities shall have jurisdiction, subject to the conditions laid down in this Article, to give preliminary rulings on the validity and interpretation of framework decisions and decisions, on the interpretation of conventions established under this Title and on the validity and interpretation of the measures implementing them.
2. By a declaration made at the time of signature of the Treaty of Amsterdam or at any time thereafter, any Member State shall be able to accept the jurisdiction of the Court of Justice to give preliminary rulings as specified in paragraph 1.

3. A Member State making a declaration pursuant to paragraph 2 shall specify that either:

(a)any court or tribunal of that State against whose decisions there is no judicial remedy under national law may request the Court of Justice to give a preliminary ruling on a question raised in a case pending before it and concerning the validity or interpretation of an act referred to in paragraph 1 if that court or tribunal considers that a decision on the question is necessary to enable it to give judgment, or

(b) any court or tribunal of that State may request the Court of Justice to give a preliminary ruling on a question raised in a case pending before it and concerning the validity of interpretation of an act referred to in paragraph 1 if that court or tribunal considers that a decision on the question is necessary to enable it to give judgment. Treaty on European Union 25

4. Any Member State, whether or not it has made a declaration pursuant to paragraph 2, shall be entitled to submit statements of case or written observations to the Court in cases which arise under paragraph 1.

5. The Court of Justice shall have no jurisdiction to review the validity or proportionality of operations carried out by the police or other law enforcement services of a Member State or the exercise of the responsibilities incumbent upon Member States with regard to the maintenance of law and order and the safeguarding of internal security.

6. The Court of Justice shall have jurisdiction to review the legality of framework decisions and decisions in actions brought by a Member State or the Commission on grounds of lack of competence, infringement of an essential procedural requirement, infringement of this Treaty or of any rule of law relating to its application, or misuse of powers. The proceedings provided for in this paragraph shall be instituted within two months of the publication of the measure.

7. The Court of Justice shall have jurisdiction to rule on any dispute between Member States regarding the interpretation or the application of acts adopted under Article 34(2) whenever such dispute cannot be settled by the Council within six months of its being referred to the Council by one of its members. The Court shall also have jurisdiction to rule on any dispute between Member States and the Commission regarding the interpretation or the application of conventions established under Article 34(2)(d).

(**) Article 68 TCE
1. Article 234 shall apply to this title under the following circumstances and conditions: where a question on the interpretation of this title or on the validity or interpretation of acts of the institutions of the Community based on this title is raised in a case pending before a court or a tribunal of a Member State against whose decisions there is no judicial remedy under national law, that court or tribunal shall, if it considers that a decision on the question is necessary to enable it to give judgment, request the Court of Justice to give a ruling thereon.

2. In any event, the Court of Justice shall not have jurisdiction to rule on any measure or decision taken pursuant to Article 62(1) relating to the maintenance of law and order and the safeguarding of internal security.

3. The Council, the Commission or a Member State may request the Court of Justice to give a ruling on a question of interpretation of this title or of acts of the institutions of the Community based on this title. The ruling given by the Court of Justice in response to such a request shall not apply to judgments of courts or tribunals of the Member States which have become res judicata.

Council continues debates on the Proposal regarding the Framework Decision on Transfer of proceedings in criminal matters

The orientation debate held in the Council on Monday 30 November on the framework decision on the transfer of proceedings in criminal matters (*) (Interinstitutional Procedure 2009/0811, Council document 13504/09) highlighted that currently there are several different legal possibilities to transfer criminal proceedings within the Union and this contributes to legal uncertainty, incompatibility between legal systems and is contrary to the Treaty objective of creating an Area of justice within the Union. The Presidency is convinced that transfer of proceedings is a missing link in the cooperation between Member States and that a provision on the creation of jurisdiction would become a cornerstone in such cooperation.
According to the Council Press Release progress has been made on several provisions. There remain, however, outstanding questions related to an essential element of this draft legislation, namely the question of jurisdiction. Ministers held a substantial discussion on the principle of jurisdiction to be used for future work on this dossier.
Continue reading “Council continues debates on the Proposal regarding the Framework Decision on Transfer of proceedings in criminal matters”