Statement by GUE/NGL MEP Barbara Spinelli on the prevention of radicalisation report vote

Barbara Spinelli, GUE/NGL shadow on the report, states: “It wasn’t an easy decision. After many months discussing the Parliament’s Initiative report on the prevention of radicalisation I decided to recommend a negative vote to my group. Although negotiations with the rapporteurs and the ‘shadows’ went rather well, and a number of our amendments were taken on board at Committee and plenary level, we believe we cannot fall prey to a policy of fear – after the terrorist attacks in Paris –  and adopt further counter-terrorism measures before assessing their proportionality and their legal necessity.”

“Indeed, we stand against the introduction of a PNR Directive (especially if extended to internal EU flights): a measure which the European Data Protection Supervisor and other important authorities have declared as neither necessary nor proportionate. Likewise, we agree with European Digital Rights’ (EDRI) assessment that encryption standards should not be arbitrarily undermined, as this would have a negative effect on innocent people’s privacy.

“We also believe that calling for the criminalisation of internet companies is a very dangerous message for regimes in the world, even more if it becomes possible on material that could be deemed legal.

Although we are not per se against border controls, we believe, as stated in an S&D amendment unfortunately rejected, that Member States must ‘refrain from using border control measures aimed at fighting terrorism and stopping the travel of suspected terrorists for immigration control purposes’: as was written in the amendment, we are ‘extremely worried by the measures taken by some governments in the EU to introduce additional border controls in order to prevent the entry into the EU of refugees and migrants, with the risk of such measures being based on arbitrariness and racial or ethnic profiling, which is totally contrary to EU principles and values, in addition to contravening Member States’ international human rights obligations’. Like the European Network Against Racism (ENAR), we are concerned that a number of proposals in the report may endanger fundamental rights in the EU, particularly for Muslims, refugees and people perceived as such.

“Moreover, one of our fundamental amendments has been rejected: the refusal of ‘the false dichotomy of security versus freedom’. In any democracy it’s an obviousness. It stops being evident in these times, dominated more by fear and anger than by reason and rule of law.”


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