Call for Human Rights
February 21, 2007
The European Union's anti-terrorism coordinator, Gijs de Vries, has criticized US tactics in the war in terror, saying that victory can only be achieved through a return to "mainstream" human rights norms and the abandonment of policies such as special rendition.
De Vries said that the abduction of terror suspects to third-party countries where torture is used in interrogation, the holding of so-called "enemy combatants" without trial at the prison camp in the US naval base in Guantanamo, Cuba and the widely-publicized abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq had all undermined the fight against Islamist extremism.
Image tarnished by scandals
"The CIA renditions, together with Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, and the military commissions act, unfortunately have tarnished the image of the United States in the fight against terrorism, among Muslims and non-Muslims," De Vries told Reuters news service. "I hope the United States, now that there is a new political dynamic in the US Congress, can return to a mainstream interpretation of international human rights."
The issue of rendition has added resonance in Europe after the European Parliament announced last week that a number of EU governments -- including Italy and Germany --knew about the secret CIA flights transporting suspects through Europe but chose to look the other way.
De Vries, the man charged with overseeing and coordinating the EU's fight against terror, was himself strongly criticized by the European Parliament for not providing answers on the allegations of complicity by EU governments in CIA rendition.
National responsibility for secret services
However, De Vries responded by saying that there had been no hard evidence to substantiate the accusations made against the EU countries by European lawmakers and that judgment should be reserved until the authorities in member states had carried out and completed their own investigations into the allegations of collusion.
He insisted that secret intelligence services remained under national control and that neither the EU as a whole nor he as anti-terrorism coordinator had much power to change that. De Vries told the European Parliament that member states should exercise more parliamentary control on the activities of their secret services.
Rebuild trust, work for peace
De Vries, who steps in March after three years in the job, said that a change in approach by the US and the EU to regain trust from the Islamic world was essential in the battle of ideas with radical Islamists.
"Ultimately that's the long-term approach we need," he said, adding that a concerted effort to bring peace to the Middle East would also help.
Until these objectives can be achieved, De Fries said, the terrorism threat in the EU would remain at its current high level and would remain so for a number of years.
"We cannot exclude that attacks on the scale of London or Madrid could be repeated. Meanwhile we see that other types of threats are also materializing," he said, referring to a recent alleged plot to kidnap and behead a British Muslim soldier in the UK.
De Vries calls for EU streamlining
He also called for a streamlining of decision-making on cooperation against terrorism and organized crime within the EU and for the introduction of majority votes instead of insisting on unanimity among all 27 countries.
"Unanimous decisions simply take too long," he said, blaming them for the EU's failure to coordinate cross border operations between national police forces when tracking international criminals.
De Fries became the European Union's first anti-terrorism coordinator just days after the bomb attacks in Madrid in March 2004, which killed 191 people.