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FOIA Sources
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Friday, January 13, 2006 8:11 PM
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Full contents see: www.statewatch.org 1. European Gendarmerie Force (EGF) to be launched in Italy on 19 January Happy New Year to all our users! 1. European Gendarmerie Force (EGF) to be launched in Italy on 19 January – and EU discussing the creation of cross-border law enforcement “Special Task Forces”: 2. EU: Report from the European Commission on: Visa waiver reciprocity (pdf) with certain third countriesthe third countries whose nationals must be in possession of visas when crossing the external borders and those whose nationals are exempt: 3. Racial violence round-up, by IRR News Team (12 January 2006) Incidents of racial violence and harassment that have taken place in the last months of 2005 and also note the results of court proceedings against perpetrators of attacks that took place after 7 July 2005: 4. Italy: Teenager beaten to death by police in Ferrara? 5. EU-USA: “Frank and non-diplomatic language” censored – Statewatch denied access to document to hide EU views on US demands 6. UK: Arrest and stop and search figures for 2004-5 (pdf): Over the year there were 851,200 “stop and searches” under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (14% more than in 2003/4). Only 11% of those stopped were arrested (13% in 2003/4). In addition there were 41,300 stop and searches under Section 60 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, with only 3% leading to an arrest, while another 35,800 were stopped and searched under S.44(1) and (2) of the Terrorism Act 2000, 1.3% leading to an arrest. See also: Surge in stop and search of Asian people after July 7 (Guardian link): 7. EU: Mandatory data retention vote in the European Parliament on 14 December 2005: The final vote on the legislative resolution was 378 in favour, 197 against with 30 abstentions. The Green/EFA and GUE (left group) voted against while the ALDE (liberal group) split with 25 MEPs voting in favour and 37 against (including Mr Alvaro, the rapporteur). The two biggest parties, the PSE (socialist group) and PPE (conservative group) overwhelmingly voted in favour – 39 PPE MEPs voted against (10 abstained) and 24 PSE MEPs voted against (2 abstained). See also: Statewatch’s Observatory on the surveillance of telecommunications in the EU: 8. UK-Greece: MI6 Athens station chief named (Cryptome, link): MI6 officer linked to abductions in Athens hunt for Tube bombers (Guardian, link): Greece urged to investigate MI6 torture link Athens MI6 station chief linked to abduction and beating of 28 migrants from Pakistan. See also Athens News (link): Swiss claim proof that CIA ran Europe jails (Guardian, link): EU-wide warrant over ‘CIA kidnap’ (BBC, link): Abu Omar was allegedly kidnapped from a Milan street An Italian court has issued Europe-wide arrest warrants for 22 suspected CIA agents accused of helping to kidnap a Muslim cleric in Milan in 2003. 9. European Federation of Journalists: Protecting our sources of information – why journalists need to resist legal attacks (pdf): 10. EU: Commission proposal for a Framework Decision on: The organisation and content of the exchange of information extracted from criminal records between Member States (pdf): See: www.statewatch.org/news/2005/dec/com-crim-records-690.pdf 11. EU: Policy Plan on Legal Migration (pdf) Communication from the European Commission COM (2005) 669: and Commission Staff Working Paper: Annex to Policy Plan on Legal Migration (pdf): See also European Commission proposals on: Priority actions for responding to the challenges of migration: First follow-up to Hampton Court (pdf) 12. EU: Green Paper from the European Commission: On conflicts of jurisdiction and the principles of ne bis in idem in criminal proceedings (pdf): and Annex: Commission Staff Working Document (pdf): 13. Norway-EU: The Norwegian government has decided it will “no longer align itself with any other [terrorist] list than that published by the UN”. In doing so it will not “align itself” with the EU lists as this “could cause difficulties for Norway in its role as neutral facilitator in certain peace processes. The government further notes that “it does not take part in the internal assessments that lead to revisions of the EU list”: Press release: Ministry of Foreign Affairs (pdf): See: Statewatch Observatory: “Terrorist” lists: monitoring proscription, designation and asset-freezing Updated, 3 January 2006: 14. UK: Terrorism Bill – as amended – 20 December 2005 in Committee in the House of Lords: 15. Germany: Refugee from Cameroon threatened with imprisonment for resisting travel restrictions imposed on asylum seekers: Synopsis: The German self-organised refugee group The Voice and the Gšttinger Arbeitskreis zur Unterstützung von Asylsuchenden e.V. is asking for support in their campaign to stop the imprisonment of Cornelius Yufanyi for fighting for his right to free movement. 16. EU: Austrian Presidency draft Agendas for the three Justice and Home Affairs Ministers’ Councils (see pages 22-28. pdf): Austrian and Finnish Presidencies of the Council of the European Union:Programme for 2006 (see pages 40-45, pdf): This includes the heading “Strengthening freedom” which is all about asylum, refugees and border controls, whose “freedom” it might be asked. 17. US-EU: The US Senate voted on 16 December 2005 to refuse to renew the Patriot Act, see Reuters (link): The reason was concerns over the lack of judicial control and congressional oversight – two crucial safeguards which the European Parliament agreed to remove from the EU Directive on mandatory data retention, see: Statewatch’s Observatory on the surveillance of telecommunications in the EU: 18. EU: “Unaccountable Europe” by Tony Bunyan (Statewatch editor) in Special issue of Index on Censorship: “Big Brother Goes Global” 19. EU: European Parliament to set up committee to look into CIA detention centres BOOKMARK News online – full contents: ________________________________________________ |
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