30.01.2007 - 09:30 CET | By Helena Spongenberg
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS – Germany has made a u-turn on its plan to criminalise Nazi insignia – such as the swastika – across the European Union, and will leave it up to the 27 member states whether or not to punish people who deny the Holocaust.

The move comes after European Hindu groups this month joined forces to fight the German plan saying that the swastika had been one of their religious symbols for around 5,000 years before Adolf Hitler's Nazi party adopted it in the 1930s.

Last week, the Italian government published a draft law which proposes penalties of up to three years in jail for inciting racial hatred, but which stopped short of making Holocaust denial a crime.

The German Justice minister Brigitte Zypries said earlier this month that Germany – which currently holds the six-month EU presidency - wanted to harmonise rules throughout the bloc for dealing with Holocaust deniers and for punishing displays of Nazi symbols, banned in Germany and eight other EU states.

But in an emailed statement, the German EU presidency said it would "not seek to prohibit specific symbols such as swastikas" when setting out plans for an EU-wide anti-racism law.

It would also not try to push all EU states to say it is a crime to deny that 6 million Jews were exterminated during the Second World War, guaranteeing "the member states the necessary leeway for maintaining their established constitutional traditions."

"The goal is to attain minimum harmonisation of provisions on criminal liability for disseminating racist and xenophobic statements," the German EU presidency said in the statement.

From Professor John Anthony Coughlan jcoughln@mail.tcd.ie

Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2007 11:48:08 -0000
  GERMAN PROPOSAL FOR CROSS-EU POLICE DATA AND OPERATIONS
17 January 2007
DRESDEN (Own report) - In spite of the strong resistance from several EU member states, the German Interior Minister is demanding that a restriction on rights of national sovereignty in the field of security be applied throughout the EU.

Following a meeting with his EU counterparts, Wolfgang Schäuble announced that Germany intends to obtain access to police data of all EU member states. Berlin can already take sovereign action in some of its neighboring states. The legal basis for this was provided by the Prüm Treaty, signed two years ago by a group of EU pioneers. Using its EU Council Presidency, Berlin is planning to initiate the incorporation of the Prüm Treaty into the EU's legal framework.
This Treaty has come under criticism in Germany because of deficits in the protection of data privacy and its lack of democratic control. The attempt to subvert legitimate resistance in the other countries, through reaching a special agreement with some of the member states, is being described in the German press as "a novelty in the European integration process". It is being voiced that this is opening the possibility of enforcing numerous legal norms, in spite of their far-reaching consequences, without ratification by the entire EU. Because of its dominating position, Germany can set its own norms. Berlin has successfully rejected Portugal's plan to adopt the admirable migration policy model legislation.
REVOLUTIONARY
The Prüm Treaty was signed by the Interior and Justice Ministers of the seven core European states[1] on May 27, 2005, but been ratified, for the time being, only by Germany, Luxembourg, Austria and Spain. For the participating states, the Treaty provides access to DNA and fingerprint databases as well as vehicle registration data. This access is available for purposes of prosecution or for preventive measures. An exchange of information on "violent offenders" and "terror suspects" - both very elastic terms - is already in progress. The Prüm Treaty also authorizes police operations on foreign territory. The German Interior Ministry calls this a "revolutionary" Treaty because it curtails sovereign rights in the field of security.[2] Internationally it is considered unique and derives from an initiative made by the former Minister of the Interior, Otto Schily (SPD).
EU-WIDE
Berlin has always sought to extend the "Prüm Treaty" to cover the entire EU. According to the German Ministry of Justice, the contracting partners' goal is "to convince as many European states as possible to join this pro-Europe Treaty". The initial plan was to evaluate the Treaty's effects and "after three years, at the most" to initiate the incorporation of the terms of the Prüm Treaty into the EU legal framework.[3]
In great haste, the German Interior Minister has already taken this initiative, even though this treaty has only been enacted in two countries (Germany and Austria), and has been effective for about six weeks. At the recent meeting of the EU's interior and justice ministers, he tabled this plan for discussion. Even though this Treaty is heavily contested not only by several European states, but also within Germany itself, its EU-wide adoption will be formally examined, under German EU Council Presidency, at the next interior and justice ministers' meeting, scheduled for February 15 and 16 in Brussels.

NO CONTROL
Gisela Piltz, the FDP parliamentary group's domestic policy spokeswoman in the German Bundestag, criticises the fact that the Prüm Treaty reduces democratic controls over the security apparatus. Police forces intervening on foreign territory are not subordinate to the sovereign representatives of that nation. "Only reference to the EU Council's recommendations from 1987(!), which are explicitly non-binding" serve as a minimum standard for the data privacy laws, according to a privacy expert.[4]
 Even if defects in the proposed system should be discovered, there is no way to "prevent the exchange of data from taking place one day after the Treaty's enactment." The intended application throughout the EU has also aroused major protest. It is expected that this international treaty, elaborated and signed by the executive, will, at best, be slipped though national parliaments without debate, and be without supervision by the European Parliament. Great Britain, Ireland, Poland and the Czech Republic have, until now, strictly refused to join this treaty.[5]
QUOTAS
The German government, while praising restrictions on rights of national sovereignty in the field of security as a "European achievement," continues nevertheless to resist an EU migration policy for Germany. German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble brusquely rejected Portugal's initiative to introduce the "Green Card" procedure throughout the EU. Schäuble wants to be in charge of restricting immigration to Germany and advocates a limited entry into the EU only on the basis of quotas of labour migrants from impoverished countries on the basis of demand from businesses.[6] An additional objective of the German EU Council Presidency is the elaboration of defences against refugees [7] and the further reinforcement of the Frontex Agency, to seal off not only the Southern but also the Eastern EU borders against unsolicited immigration.
WITH MACHETES
To facilitate the deportation of migrants, Berlin is hoping to conclude, during its EU Council Presidency, so-called "partnership treaties" with African third-party countries containing clauses  that will regulate the evacuation of refugees.  According to Berlin, Mauritania, Mali and Senegal are countries being considered as models for such treaties. It is known that Mauritanian security forces have abandoned refugees deported from the EU, in the midele of the desert.[8] Mauritania is not the only West African country known for "exceptional" treatment of refugees. Gambia, which likewise is presided over by a president brought to power through a putsch, is reported to have taken, last fall, 50 illegal immigrants from various West African countries: "As soon as they crossed the border from Senegal into Gambia, they were arrested and were brought to the Marine headquarters in the Gambian capital, Banjul.[9] Tied with cords and electric cable, they were transported by the military to different locations on the outskirts of Banjul, where they were executed, some with machetes." It is with Gambia, of all countries, that Germany intends to conclude its fourth model treaty, including regulations for deportation.
[1] Belgium, Deutschland, Frankreich, Luxemburg, die Niederlande, Österreich und Spanien.
[2] Die Revolution von Prüm; Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 16.01.2007
[3] Vereinfachte grenzüberschreitende Zusammenarbeit - Prümer Vertrag; www.bmj.bund.de
[4] Thilo Weichert: Wo liegt Prüm? Der polizeiliche Datenaustausch in der EU bekommt eine neue Dimension; www.datenschutzzentrum.de/polizei/060329-pruem.htm
[5] Germany seeks to modernize policing across EU; International Herald Tribune 15.01.2007
[6] see also Nicht verwertbar and Nicht verwertbar (II)
[7] see also Festung Europa
[8] see also Um jeden Preis and In die Wüste
[9] Präsident bleibt, die Bürger gehen; taz 22.09.2006   © Informationen zur Deutschen Außenpolitik

info@german-foreign-policy.com

Germany issues CIA arrest orders

Germany has issued arrest warrants for 13 people over the alleged-CIA backed kidnapping of a German citizen, officials and local media say.

Munich prosecutors said that the warrants were linked to the case of Khaled al-Masri, a German national of Lebanese descent.

Mr Masri says he was seized in 2003 in Macedonia, flown to a secret prison in Afghanistan and mistreated there.

He has been trying to file a lawsuit against the CIA over his claims.

German officials said in September that they had received a list of 20 people involved in the alleged kidnapping from Spanish investigators.BBC WORLD NEWS

Ministers 'knew about rendition flights'

By Stephen Castle in Brussels

Published: 24 January 2007

European governments, including Britain, knew about secret CIA flights across the continent, MEPs concluded yesterday, as they lambasted politicians and senior officials for failing to co-operate with an inquiry into secret US renditions.

Britain's former defence secretary Geoff Hoon, now minister for Europe, was criticised in a report which "deplored" the way he co-operated with a committee investigating claims that the CIA operated secret flights in the EU and set up covert prisons on European soil.

The EU's foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, was also criticised and MEPs questioned the "real substance of the post of European Union counter-terrorism co-ordinator occupied by Gijs de Vries", drawing attention to his "lack of credibility". Overall the UK emerged as one of the countries which tolerated a significant number of "black flights" and failed to assist British citizens who were abducted in other countries.

The document, agreed yesterday, expressed "serious concern about the 170 stopovers made by CIA-operated aircraft at UK airports, which on many occasions came from or were bound for countries linked with extraordinary rendition circuits and the transfer of detainees". It deplored "the stopovers at UK airports of aircraft which have been shown to have been used by the CIA", on other occasions, for "extraordinary renditions".

The authors of the report also said they were outraged by the legal opinion of the Foreign Office adviser Michael Wood "according to which receiving or possessing information extracted under torture, as long as there is no direct participation in the torture, is not prohibited".

The year-long investigation into CIA activities has established enough circumstantial evidence to corroborate widespread reports of secret rendition, the report's authors say.

The committee set up to investigate the claims interviewed witnesses and obtained information from Eurocontrol, the EU's air safety agency, which revealed that more than 1,200 undeclared CIA flights entered European airspace after 11 September 2001.

The inquiry concluded: "It is implausible, on the basis of the testimonies and documents received, that certain European governments were not aware of the activities linked to extraordinary rendition on their territory". It was also "implausible that many hundreds of flights ...could have taken place without the knowledge of either the security services or the intelligence services".

Compiled by the Italian Socialist MEP Giovanni Fava, the report concluded that "in some cases, temporary secret detention facilities in European countries may have been located at US military bases".

Polish centre-right MEPs pushed through an amendment stating that the evidence gathered does not prove that CIA secret prisons were based in Poland, one of the allegations that prompted the investigation.

Baroness Ludford, justice spokeswoman for the Liberal Democrats in the European Parliament said: "Geoff Hoon's actions in failing to co-operate with this investigation, no doubt borne out of a sense of panic as he was Defence Secretary while many of these events took place, have rightly been censored in this report."

Claude Moraes, a member of the European Parliament's civil liberties, justice & home affairs committee, said the document had produced "compelling circumstantial evidence but no smoking gun".

© 2006 Independent News and Media Limited

SOLANA WAR-MONGER?

EU ready for more military operations, Solana says

18.01.2007 - 17:43 CET | By Andrew Rettman
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - Europe says it is ready for more military action under the EU flag in 2007 after its "success" in Congo last year, with the German EU presidency putting Kosovo, Bosnia, Lebanon and Afghanistan at the top of its defence agenda for the next six months.

"We begin 2007 ready to take up our responsibilities if needed - which I sincerely hope won't be the case - but we are in a position of readiness," EU top diplomat Javier Solana said in Brussels on Wednesday (17 January), after recalling that the EU's "battle group" structure reached "full operational capacity" on 1 January.

The EU now has two units that can be deployed for "crisis-management" anywhere in the world 10 days after member states take a unanimous vote, in a decision that would "as a rule" follow a UN security council resolution but that could also see the EU go it alone.

Each group brings together 1,500 soldiers from two or three member states, which hold joint training exercises and wear both national and EU insignia - a blue disk with 12 gold stars - on the model of EU police missions in Bosnia and Macedonia.

"Europe can assume very important peacekeeping and peacemaking functions in this world," German defence minister Franz Josef Jung said, while standing next to Mr Solana. "Europe is a great peace project and we will continue to make our contribution [to global stability]."

EU army by stealth?
No EU battle group has ever been tested in a real operation, but last year saw two major EU military projects: member states coordinated sending 9,000 European peacekeepers under a UN flag to Lebanon and dispatched 1,400 soldiers under an EU flag to Congo.

"Now we really have the beginning of a European army," French general Christian Damay said in Kinshasa in December, with France, Germany, Spain, Italy and Poland broadly supporting a gradual move toward a permanently standing EU force that could number several thousands of soldiers.

Other states, such as the UK and the Netherlands, are more worried about trespassing on NATO turf however, with no high-profile discussion of the concept taking place at EU level for now. "An EU 'army' is a very big word, but [any army] would be something very small," an EU official told EUobserver.

The notion of an EU army is a red rag to eurosceptic parties in Europe, but some pro-integration politicians such as British liberal MEP Graham Watson also believe the trend toward ever-closer practical defence co-operation should be subject to open discussion on political implications.

"I don't think governments can go on building a European army by stealth - we need a proper public debate," Mr Watson stated, adding that more and more policies are "being done in the council [the EU member states' secretariat] and reported after the fact."

Kosovo to dominate 2007 agenda
Apart from building-up battle group capacity, the German EU presidency will focus on managing the "EU-dominated" force in Lebanon and exploring ways for EU police to support NATO in Afghanistan.

A gradual pull-out of the EU police mission from Bosnia is also on the agenda - but a new EU police force will replace NATO soldiers in Kosovo after the region's final status is settled, Germany's Mr Jung said.

The EU is currently preparing what is expected to be the biggest-ever security operation in its history in Kosovo, involving policing but also institution-building, due to start this summer at the earliest.

Brussels is currently awaiting the result of Serbian elections on Sunday before UN envoy Marti Ahtisaari presents a proposal for the final status of the territory in February.

General eyes 'European army' after Congo mission
EUobserver. . . 01.12.2006 - 09:18 CET | By Honor Mahony
After its mission overseeing elections in Congo, EU troops are well on their way to being able to work as a common EU army, according to their French general.
"I am very satisfied because I believe that we have a very well-functioning unit," said general Christian Damay on Thursday in Kinshasa, according to Reuters.

"Now we really have the beginning of a European army."

Discussions about creating a European army are not new, with Polish President Lech Kaczynski recently suggesting there should be a multinational EU army of 100,000 troops to support NATO missions.

He lobbied the idea both to German chancellor Angela Merkel and European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso, but critics say the creation of an actual army is a long way off.

At the moment, the EU is working on the creation of its battle groups - small battalions of troops that can be deployed rapidly to troubled spots in the world - with the first two set to be operational from January.

General Damay's words come just as EU troops are packing their bags to leave Congo after having been in the country to monitor elections for four months - their mandate expired yesterday (30 November).

Under their watch President Joseph Kabila was re-elected on 29 October and is due to be sworn into office on 6 December

The 1,400-strong Congo mission has been held up as a shining example of a successful peacekeeping mission - however it also came in for criticism for having several troops stationed in neighbouring Gabon and for not having soldiers in the troubled eastern part of the vast country.
There is also concern that the EU is pulling out although the situation is still unstable with tensions between President Kabila and his election rival, the ex-rebel Jean-Pierre Bemba, running high.

South Africa's deputy foreign affairs minister Aziz Pahad recently urged the EU to extend the deployment of its force beyond its November 30 cut-off date, saying it was vital that the international peacekeepers do not

Leeds University under Attack

By Gilad Atzmon

28 January 2007

Gilad Atzmon highlights the case of a Zionist's attempt to bully Britain's Leed University into silencing a Palestinian website.

A few days ago I learnt about Bonsoir. It is a website maintained by a young Palestinian postgraduate student at Leeds University. The site is a must see; it is an online Palestinian film library, a sort of "Palestinian YouTube". The person who created the site is Akram Awad, who has gathered in a section called Palorama an impressive collection of live audiovisual materials about Palestine and the Middle East, and documents that present the ever-growing Zionist crime in sound and movement. I have also learnt that he is active in a very humble way, not seeming to be one who craves attention, but who cares about what he is doing.

Three days ago I wrote to Mr Awad to tell him how impressed I was with his site. Last night he wrote back. Although he has not drawn attention to his case, I have learnt that the young exiled Palestinian student is under fire. The Zionist lobby in Britain has utilized its heavy cannons against him and especially against his message.

Just like in North America, where external funds help Zionist lobbies to dictate the academic discourse, Leeds University, a respected UK academic institution, is coming now under similar very heavy pressure. 

I learnt form the Yorkshire Post today that "Marilyn Stowe, an expert in divorce law and member of the legal advisory group to the Law Commission, said she could no longer offer a proposed five-figure sum after learning [that] a postgraduate student, who also works for the university, was running a website containing anti-Semitic material". 

Yet, Mr Awad clearly states on his site and in the UK press that he is an anti-Zionist, not an anti-Semite. He should not have even gone through the trouble, because it is apparent that the site is dedicated to disseminiating information on Palestine and the people of Palestine. He does not criticize Jews as an ethnic or racial group, but any mention of Jews is connected in a concrete way to the political actions of Israel and is solely concerned with Zionism as an ideology and in practice. Moreover, Mr Awad's site contains some original articles, but much of it is set as an online archive. It is a collection of films that express a wide variety of ideas and expression, assuming that in a free world people are entitled to listen to other views and can make up their own minds. 

Mrs Stowe said:
I have enormous concerns that Leeds University has been publicly linked with a website which is publishing anti-Semitic material and with the greatest regret I cannot be associated with Leeds University until this matter is resolved. I expect they will now take steps to deal with this situation and not be perceived as pursuing a policy hostile to a particular group of students.

Mrs Stowe is obviously entitled to decide what she wants to do with her money. However, it is rather obvious that Mrs Stowe sets the conditions of her support for the university by raising a clear demand for conformity of thoughts.

May I remind Mrs Stowe that the word university is derived from the Latin universitas magistrorum et scholarium (community of masters and scholars). Mr Awad's website is exactly what universitas stands for. It provides the world community with direct access to Palestinian discourse. It makes knowledge available. It is there to share the notion of Zionist brutality with every internet user on this planet. Mrs Stowe is rather unhappy with this. She somehow prefers to silence the opponents of Israel. She prefers restricting discourse. Mrs Stowe, herself a graduate from Leeds University, may have forgotten what academic freedom is all about. But far more worrying, being a lawyer she is actually acting against freedom of speech.

Mrs Stowe's behaviour is just another red light warning for the UK academic world. Seemingly, Zionist lobbies are there to exploit the diminishing governmental financial support for higher education. Zionist lobbies will do whatever they can to interfere with academic freedom. Zionists know that "freedom of thought" and ethical awareness are the gravest threats to Israeli politics and the Zio-centric discourse. Beware!

ITALY PLANS INTERNATIONAL BAN ON DEATH PENALTY - Britain, Holland, Denmark and Hungary have the insolence to ban this without any Government debates, at a meeting of European Foreign Ministers during the last week in January. British Diplomats said the "did not wish to create difficulties for the United States at a delicate time". Europeans by and large wish to eradicate the Death Penalty and this is the second time Tony Blair has refused to consider it. Meantime Italy's plea to Libyan leader, Gaddafi, to spare Bulgarian nurses believed to have spread HIV after an inconclusive trial, is receiving "reflections".