AMBASSADORS SIGN EUROPOL CONVENTION IN BRUSSELS
On 26 July, the representatives of the 15 EU-member states finally signed the Convention on the setting up of Europol. The act was marked by an atmosphere of intimacy unusual at such occasions.
Indeed, the document was not signed by solemn and important ministers ceremoniously showing up for the European press, as one would have expected, but merely by the COREPER ambassadors of the member states. Apparently, the Council does not feel very proud about the Convention in its present shape.
According to diplomats, the Benelux countries, Germany and Italy added a protocol to the convention text. The protocol makes reference of the decision of the Cannes European Council that a regulation on the judicial role of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) must be agreed until June 1996. The Benelux countries went even further by expressly making a "satisfactory solution" a pre-requisite for their ratifying the Convention.
By simply leaving out the controversial provisions on jurisdiction over Europol, the heads of government of the member states are hoping to enable the wearisome ratification process to begin at once. The Europol chief, Jürgen Storbeck, has said that this compromise solution made it possible to begin now with the "technical and organisational" preparation of Europol. This probably means no less than that the controversial automated information systems of Europol will be set up without a regulation on the role of the judiciary in compliance with fundamental democratic and constitutional standards.
Two other conventions signed
The two other conventions signed by the ambassadors on 26 July were the CIS (Customs Information System) Convention and the Convention on the Protection of the Financial Interests if the Community (under which serious fraud will be a criminal offence that is imprisonable and extraditable). For these two conventions, the UK apparently agreed that for inter-state disputes and disputes between the member states and the Commission, the ECJ could be involved.
Transparency gone for its holiday
The precise agreement reached on postponement of the ECJ issue is said to have been described not in a press release, but in a communique from the Council. However, our attempts to obtain a copy of this text from the Council Administration failed lamentably. The entire Council, including its allegedly "permanent" representatives, we were told, is currently on a holiday, and consequently, no documents are available before 1 September on the affairs of the European Union.
Sources: Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 27.7.95, 4.7.95; a friendly and lonesome caretaker at the Council-building in Brussels; our sources.