Russia tensions stoke debate, Johansson vows stronger online safety rules
Week 2: January 10 to 14
Russian threat stokes further debate on EU military union
As NATO and Russia continue negotiations to avoid an escalation of the conflict in Ukraine, the EU has found itself out of the loop, and that’s causing plenty of frustration in Brussels and beyond. At the end of December, the EU’s top diplomat Josep Borrell told Die Welt that Europe “must be involved” in any negotiations, but that has not come to pass, and despite his best diplomatic efforts, including a visit to the frontline in Ukraine, Europe remains sidelined. "Russia simply does not see the EU as a powerful or strong player in the game," Tinatin Akhvlediani of the Centre for European Policy Studies in Brussels told the BBC.
"Two things are clear: we have to come to a united EU position and we have to substantiate our role, backing it up with concrete action tracks, i.e. not just on what we think or want but on what we intend to do." - Josep Borrell on the situation in Ukraine, January 12
Inevitably, the EU’s absence from negotiations about the biggest security issue in its backyard has led to much soul-searching about security integration across the bloc. "Do we have missiles, ships, cannons, armies?" asked Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi in December. "At the moment we don't."
At least not for now. But one thing is certain; 2022 will see concrete steps towards further unification on security issues in the European Union. At the top of the European Commission, and in the union’s most powerful states, the ambition is full military integration. Commission president Ursula von der Leyen put it plainly in her 2021 State of the Union address: “What we need is the European Defence Union.”
This year’s first steps were taken on Thursday as defence ministers met to discuss the EU’s new military strategy document - titled, in typical Brussels-speak, the “Strategic Compass” - which is due to be adopted in March. The crises along the union’s eastern border - in Ukraine, Belarus and elsewhere - have already led to the draft of the document being amended to include “stronger support for Eastern European partners”, according to EurActiv.
In December, the influential EU Institute for Security Studies (EUISS) published a set of recommendations to be considered ahead of the adoption of the Strategic Compass, and they capture the full scale of the ambitions held for a common European defence infrastructure.
“Specific capability clusters that may provide the most utility to the EU over the coming 5-10 years include air capabilities (aircraft, strategic transport, tankers), enablers (space, cyber, training) and naval capabilities (frigates, submarines, and unmanned vehicles).”
The paper also advocates that the EU be given “greater flexibility… to allow for coalitions of the willing to undertake military action and to ensure that the EU can support European-led ad hoc missions and operations” - in other words, for the EU to stage its own military interventions when it deems necessary - and calls on the bloc to “to rapidly develop its Space Traffic Management capacities to protect its interests in space.” Look forward to an open tender process for the new EU Starship Trooper uniform.
The Strategic Compass is unlikely to meet all these ambitions - all 27 member states will have their say, and though most of the major powerbrokers will be pushing for all they can get, there will be enough dissent from smaller member states like Denmark and Malta to water down their most far-reaching goals. And that’s not to mention the external opposition - NATO and the US have long voiced opposition to a full military union, as has the UK.
A fully-fledged European Union army may be some way off, but, every year, the bloc edges closer to that reality. Last year, for example, saw the launch of the European Peace Facility saw the provision of €5bn to allow the EU to potentially supply “military and defence related equipment, infrastructure or assistance… for our partners anywhere in the world,” and the introduction of the EU’s first armed uniformed service - the standing corps of Frontex, Europe’s border agency. The adoption of the Strategic Compass, whatever amendments may come between now and March, will mark another step or two along the road.
To hear both sides of the debate, listen to this discussion from BBC Radio 4’s Analysis.
EU to up pressure on tech giants to tackle online child abuse
The EU has drawn the ire of tech giants like Google and Facebook (now Meta) in recent years for its implementation of some of the world’s most stringent tech regulation, and recent comments from home affairs commissioner Ylva Johansson suggest that’s not likely to change any time soon.
Speaking to Die Welt, Johansson outlined her plans to introduce new laws this year to force tech companies to detect, report, and remove child sexual abuse, a significant overhaul of current rules in which the reporting of violations is voluntary.
“During the pandemic, where more perpetrators were at home in isolation, the demand for material depicting child sexual abuse has increased, in some EU member states by up to 25 percent… We need to create an environment where businesses, big and small, understand their obligation to address child sexual abuse.” - Commissioner Ylva Johansson in Die Welt, January 9
But, if past experience is anything to go by, Johansson’s proposals are likely to cause quite a few headaches, and not just in the hallowed halls of Google and Facebook. Last year, lawmakers in the European Parliament voted through a bill to allow tech giants to scan their own platforms for child abuse material without fear of violating GDPR, the union’s data protection and privacy regulation, but many MEPs felt they had no other choice.
“Madam Commissioner, I think we both know that the result on the table is legally flawed. We also know that there’s been, I would say, almost undue pressure on the process, including moral blackmail – not least by Facebook, who put pressure on the process by stopping or reducing their activities, and I think that’s absolutely scandalous.” - Dutch MEP Sophie in 't Veld in the European Parliament, July 5
Any new regulations are likely to brush up against the EU’s current privacy laws, and privacy groups have been vocal about the need for a proportionate response to the problem that doesn’t infringe on individual rights.
But the problem isn’t going away, and has only grown more acute over the past 24 months. In June 2020, Europol, the EU’s police agency, said it had received a record number of referrals regarding child sexual abuse material, and tied the rise to the onset of COVID-19 lockdowns in many countries, and in its Internet Organized Crime Threat Assessment, published last November, said it had observed a steep increase in online grooming activity.
Balancing the need for action with the obligations set out by current legislation will be tricky, and whatever Johannson proposes is certain to be given close attention by both sides of the debate.
For more on this issue, check out the below discussion, recorded in December at the 11th Annual European Data Protection & Privacy Conference.
Profile: Roberta Metsola
Next Tuesday is likely to see the Maltese MEP Roberta Metsola elected as the new President of the European Parliament following the death of David Sassoli on January 11.
Metsola, a member of the Nationalist Party at home and of the European People's Party in Brussels, is seen by supporters as a archetypal model of European values - or, as Politico Europe less charitably put it, a “classic product of the Brussels bubble.” She is an outspoken advocate of a free press, supports more liberal migration policies, and has been a consistent supporter of gender equality.
Her positions on some of these issues have made her a divisive figure at home. When she was first flagged as a potential successor to Sassoli last year, support from Valletta was, at best, grudging. "If I did not support her nomination, I would be doing exactly what she did to our country. Therefore, the answer is obvious: yes I support her," said Labour Prime Minister Robert Abela. His party has long seen Metsola as an opportunist whose outspoken challenges on corruption issues have damaged Malta on the world stage.
Indeed, Metsola’s support for the family of the murdered Maltest journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia have made her the target of death threats and abuse, but her constant pressure on the topic was ultimately vindicated. Last year, an inquiry found the country’s former prime minister Joseph Muscat and his cabinet created “an atmosphere of impunity… leading to a collapse in the rule of law” and “should shoulder responsibility for the assassination.”
Metsola is also seen as one of the leading figures in parliament on the issue of migration, and, particularly as chair of the Frontex Scrutiny Working Group, has proven to be a significant thorn in the side of Europe’s border agency Frontex. In June of last year, the group published a report which was highly critical of the agency, accusing it of turning a blind eye to human rights violations (you can read my piece for NBC News on Frontex, which covers the investigation, here.)
In short, Metsola is an advocate many of the so-called “European values” so often spoken about, if not necessarily lived up to, by leading EU figures. But there is one issue in particular where questions marks remain - the issue of abortion. Last June, for example, she voted against the Matic report, which called for universal access to safe and legal abortion, and has a track record of voting against or abstaining on pro-choice votes.
French MEPs, in particular, have been vocal in their criticism of Metsola’s record, and the leading French daily Le Monde didn’t disguise its distaste at the prospect of Metsola stepping into the role:
Forty-two years after having electing as head of the institution Simone Veil, who had just legalized the voluntary termination of pregnancy in France, European parliamentarians are tempted to elect another woman who has never hidden her opposition to abortion.
Metsola, meanwhile, has vowed she will represent the “majority voice” of the parliament on abortion if elected, whatever that may be. But, particularly in the absence of a candidate from the Socialists and Democrats, it is unlikely that her stance on abortion will derail her candidacy, and next Tuesday should see Metsola become the highest-ranking politician in Maltese history.
ICYMI
MEPs seek probe into EU commissioner over Bosnia via EU Observer
"Commission representatives cannot appear to appease separatist movements in this manner or act beyond their mandate contrary to official EU policy pertaining to the Western Balkan region," the letter said, which was drawn up by Hungarian liberal MEP Katalin Cseh.
Pushbacks in Aegean almost double in 2021 via Aegean Boat Report
In 2021, pushback cases have increased 94.1% compared to 2020, and the number of people pushed back has increased 62.2%.
A data ‘black hole’: Europol ordered to delete vast store of personal data via The Guardian
According to internal documents seen by the Guardian, Europol’s cache contains at least 4 petabytes – equivalent to 3m CD-Roms or a fifth of the entire contents of the US Library of Congress. Data protection advocates say the volume of information held on Europol’s systems amounts to mass surveillance and is a step on its road to becoming a European counterpart to the US National Security Agency (NSA), the organisation whose clandestine online spying was revealed by whistleblower Edward Snowden.
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Follow the FOIAs
Over at AskTheEU.org, Heiko Roth, a data protection expert, has put in a number of requests to ascertain if various institutions of the EU - the Commission, the Council of the EU, the Parliament, and the European Data Protection Board - are using data processing services based outside the union, and if so, if they are fully compliant with GDPR. You can follow the requests here, here, here, and here.
A request put in by Eva Short of Ireland’s Sunday Business Post also caught my eye - the EU has come in for severe criticism from some quarters, including notable rights organisations such as Human Rights Watch, for obstructing the implementation of a so-called TRIPs waiver - a temporary patent waiver for COVID-19 drugs until widespread vaccination is in place globally. Short has requested details on meetings between the Commission’s trade directorate and the World Trade Organisation (WTO), Medicines San Frontiers (MSF) and the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations, and details of correspondence between the parties regarding the TRIPs waiver. Follow the request here.
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Next week…
The European Parliament will select its new president next Tuesday following the death of David Sassoli earlier this week. The leading candidate to replace Sassoli is Maltese MEP Roberta Metsola, profiled above. Three others will be in the race: Swedish MEP Alice Bah Kuhnke of the Greens, Polish MEP Kosma Złotowski from the European Conservatives and Reformists, and Spanish MEP Sira Rego, The Left’s candidate.