New article 31
"Article 31
1. Common action on judicial co-operation in criminal matters shall include:
(a) facilitating and accelerating co-operation between competent ministries and judicial or equivalent authorities of the Member States, including, where appropriate, co-operation through EuroJust, in relation to proceedings and the enforcement of decisions;
(b) facilitating extradition between Member States;
(c) ensuring compatibility in rules applicable in the Member States, as may be necessary to improve such co-operation;
(d) preventing conflicts of jurisdiction between Member States;
(e) progressively adopting measures establishing minimum rules relating to the constituent elements of criminal acts and to penalties in the fields of organised crime, terrorism and illicit drug trafficking.
2. The Council shall encourage co-operation through Eurojust by:
(a) enabling Eurojust to facilitate proper co-ordination between Member States' national prosecuting authorities;
(b) promoting support by Eurojust for criminal investigations in cases of serious cross border crime, particularly in the case of organised crime, taking account, in particular, of analyses carried out by Europol;
(c) facilitating close co-operation between Eurojust and the European Judicial Network, particularly, in order to facilitate the execution of letters rogatory and the implementation of extradition requests."
Nice talks about "facilitating and accelerating co-operation between competent ministries and judicial or equivalent authorities of the Member States" a lot of this will be building on the swinging measures already included in the Treaty of Europe. These have been added to by the Schengen agreement signed in Luxembourg in 1985 and further added to by the Amsterdam Treaty, the Tampere convention (Finland) and the Dublin convention on asylum seekers. Lets look at each briefly.
There is also a new Title VI "to provide citizens with a high level of safety within an area of freedom, security and justice by developing common action among the Member States in the fields of police and judicial co-operation in criminal matters and by preventing and combating racism and xenophobia." This objective is to be "achieved by preventing and combating crime, organized or otherwise, in particular terrorism, trafficking in persons and offences against children, illicit drug trafficking and illicit arms trafficking, corruption and fraud."
The Shengen agreement was originally signed by five EU governments Paris, Bonn, Brussels, Amsterdam, and Luxembourg. This was then incorporated into the treaty of Europe at Amsterdam. The Schengen agreement was to be about the freedom of movement over the "internal borders" between the Schengen countries. But just four articles in the convention are about open borders and 138 are about increased control. Even those four giving free movement to EU citizens have been suspended for example on the Italian border before the Genoa protest. Everyone trying to get into the EU had to be checked against the Schengen Information System (SIS) files. In 1995 this system consisted of 30,000 computer terminals and a central computer that at the beginning of this year had a capacity of 9 million records, with plans to expand.
Reports on people could also be stored in SIS for the purpose of "discreet surveillance" or "specific checks" where "concrete evidence gives reason to suppose" that the information is "necessary for the prevention of a serious threat by the person concerned or other threats to internal or external State security." According to this, a person can be placed under surveillance not because of his or her own acts but because of "other threats" to the state security.
The treaty of Amsterdam introduced a new title IV of the European treaty, which sought to regularise treatment of asylum seekers trying to gain entry to all European states. This was also the first time that they were specifically criminalised - this position has continued from the EU, governments and the media where asylum seekers are termed 'illegal immigrants' and roped in with child pornography, stolen vehicles, terrorism, counter fitting and drug offences
The EU has outlined how it intends to implement the provisions of the Amsterdam Treaty on an area of freedom, security and justice in two important policy documents. In December 1998, the JHA Council submitted an Action Plan of the Council and the Commission to the Vienna European Council (hereafter Vienna Action Plan) and in October 1999 the European Council adopted Presidency Conclusions at a specially convened summit on asylum and immigration which was held in Tampere, Finland.
They have also being working on a group that can implement the draconian schemes. The European police force Europol was established on the first of October 1998. Europol has now got a full legal framework and can deal with all forms of serious crime under the Europol convention, which came into force in 1999. Already these officers enjoy immunity from prosecution by other police forces though as yet they cannot over ride them. They are how ever engaged in building a massive database, which (according to one British Eurosceptic web page) will contain information on ethnic origins, sexuality, political and religious views. They already have permission to ask national police forces to carry out investigations
Mean while the future gets scary. For example Tony Blair and his Italian counter part Guiliano Amato co signed a frightening article in the Observer in February 2001.
Amongst other things they advocate:
"fuller use of Europol and member-state intelligence in fighting human trafficking and people smuggling. We call on member states to join us in committing ourselves fully by sending immigration experts to Europol to increase the exchange of intelligence (for example, against gangs involved in trafficking women) and develop a more tactical focus to identify operational targets. We plan to have our own experts in place within four months."