EU ministers plan passenger record scrutiny to counter jihadist threat

The EU is planning to step up border checks and passport controls to counter the threat of returning jihadist fighters, which will include getting a controversial EU PNR (Passenger Name Records) bill in place before the end of the year.

The Commission wants to start the surveillance of internal EU flights, a proposal that has been stuck in the European Parliament for the past two years due to privacy issues.

During yesterday’s justice and home affairs meeting in Luxembourg, minister said they were nterested in systematic electronic checks of documents – instead of the more standard visual checks – of EU citizens leaving and entering the passport-free Schengen zone.

The checks would link up national police databases, the Schengen Information System (an EU-wide criminal database), and Interpol resources.

“We may be faced soon with returns, huge returns from Syria and Iraq,” the EU’s counter-terrorism co-ordinator Gilles de Kerchove, told reporters in Luxembourg, adding that US-led airstrikes against Islamic State (IS) in Syria could prompt European nationals fighting alongside the jihadists to go back home.

“Airstrikes give incentive for more returns and therefore we have to be ready now to detect returns and be prepared”.

France, Germany, and the UK, are drawing up legislation to confiscate returning fighters’ passports.

Irregular immigration

Italian minister for the interior Angelino Alfano yesterday also announced the imminent end of Italy’s naval search and rescue operation, Mare Nostrum, which is credited with saving almost 100,000 boat migrants since the beginning of the year.

It will be phased out entirely as the EU’s smaller Triton mission gets ready to start in November. “We always said we would close down Mare Nostrum once Europe did its share. We now can feel Europe is doing its share,” Alfano said.

Malta’s home affairs minister Manuel Mallia said Frontex needed to be given the financial resources that will allow it to perform the tasks we have entrusted to it.

Malta will support Italy, as the host member state of Operation Triton, and Frontex, with a view to participate in the Frontex mission. Maltese officers are in Rome holding discussions on this subject.

“A year ago, we were sitting in this building shocked by the incident in which almost 400 people drowned a mile off Lampedusa and a few days later we were again shaken by another similar tragedy south of Malta and Lampedusa. We set up a Task Force to identify actions to be taken, which we did, and yet people continue to lose their lives in the Mediterranean.

“A year later and reports point to this year as among the worst in terms of the number of migrants who have lost their life at sea in search of a better life. Just recently, we had what is certainly among the worst incidents, with migrants who survived recounting how their boat was rammed by smugglers until it capsized and sent hundreds to their deaths, all while the smugglers watched unmoved.

“These incidents highlight the brutality of the criminal networks behind the migrant tragedy we are witnessing. These incidents bring to us realities which shock us and our citizens. At the same time, unrest continues all around us, in Syria, in Libya among others, and the number of people seeking protection continues to grow. Implementation of these actions which we have listed in the paper before us today needs to be given utmost priority – we have to deal with it as a matter of urgency.”

Member states are being asked to make better use of a policy that requires point-of-entry member states to take charge of asylum requests.

Those who are processed either remain in the member state of arrival or are resettled internally. Around 75% of all asylum seekers end up either in Italy, Sweden, Germany, UK, or France. “There are many countries in the European Union today who receive basically no refugees or asylum seekers,” EU commissioner for home affairs Cecilia Malmstrom, said.

The document notes that use of relocation should remain voluntary.

But the lack of ‘solidarity’ from other member states has caused annoyance with some calling upon a system of quotas.

Germany, for its part, is pushing for a quota system based on population size. “We have to agree on the quotas, for example by population size. Then we would have to ensure that those countries that are over their quota get some relief,” said Germany’s interior minister Thomas de Maizere.