SECRET negotiations on allowing US investigators greater access to criminal suspects in Europe could weaken human rights protection across the EU, London's Green Party MEP Jean Lambert has warned.
A proposed co-operation agreement with the US to be discussed by EU home secretaries meeting in Copenhagen on Friday (September 13) could allow suspects to be tried twice for the same crime, contravene existing data protection legislation and even erode Europe's absolute ban on the death penalty, Mrs Lambert told home secretary David Blunkett.
"The proposed co-operation agreement will not only weaken human rights protection across Europe, it will do so without any public discussion or parliamentary scrutiny, at either the European or the domestic level," Mrs Lambert said.
"The agreement started out, understandably, with the aim of combating terrorism. In the meantime it has evolved - behind closed doors - into a far broader proposal covering criminal investigations in general."
In a letter to the Home Secretary Mrs Lambert expressed her concern at the proposals and called for Mr Blunkett to bring the negotiations out into the open.
She warned Mr Blunkett the agreement lacks safeguards
in three vital
areas:
Data Protection: US investigators would be given access to data on criminal suspects held by EU member states despite the US having no data protection laws in place
Death Penalty: The agreement would undermine the commitment made by all EU states under Protocol 13 to the European Convention of Human Rights not to extradite criminal suspects to jurisdictions in which they face the death penalty
'Double Jeopardy': the agreement would prevent member states refusing to extradite criminal suspects facing a second trial for a crime of which they have already been acquitted
"The EU negotiating team is apparently failing to insist on these key issues of concern to Europeans and glossing over the potential points of disagreement with the US," Mrs Lambert told the Home Secretary.
"I urge you on behalf of the UK to raise these problems with your European counterparts and ensure the necessary safeguards are introduced."
ENDS