While it is evident that for most movements and individuals addressed by the EL do get involved into left politics thanks to the so-called bourgeois fundamental and freedom values. In effect, the fact that such rights are claimable, that is the demand for referendums on the EU constitution or the right to demonstration and freedom of opinion, promotes the actions by such movements and individuals in the social field.

At the same time, we face the problem that at the European level the decisions concerning civil rights are taken in the so-called “EU third pillar”, so that in this case neither the citizens not the European Parliament get involved in the decision-making process.

This “third pillar” is used to cover – so that the public opinion will not be informed about that - the establishment of a new security structure in Europe. At present we are confronted with a lot of decision in the third pillar. Some examples:

1. With the EU accession of ten countries in May 2004, the field of action of Schengen Information System (SIS and SIS II) was enlarged. In future also, this European detection system will also store biometric data. Under the German EU presidency, the EU will allow intelligence agencies to get to information usually reserved to police data systems. Therefore, there will be no separation between information stored by police to be used in courts and information based on speculation as stored by intelligence agencies.

2. At the same time, the EU has no proper system to protect personal data. For many years, the EU is in desperate need of a sort of catalogue for personal data protection. Even now, it is possible to easily exchange, buy data or speculate on future actions without the interested individuals being aware. And this is dangerous above all for political activists.

3. Moreover, for three years the EU has transmitted data on each flight passenger travelling to the US to the US intelligence agencies to fight – as they say – terror. Opposite to what has been agreed upon in the October 2006 agreement, these data are not stored just three and half years: instead, through the “Automated Targeting System” they are stored forty years and connected with personal data freely available all over the world.

4. In this sense, we will have to do, in the future, with this data storage, which is the largest personal data collection of the world on individuals from a whole continent. In the future the system will store all phone calls for a half a year, as well as phone speakers, the place phone calls take place, actions of phone speakers during the phone call, and so on.

5. At the moment, the German EU-presidency wants to enlarge the field of competences of Europol, with no control of the European Parliament or national parliaments. Moreover, last year the EU established a border protection agency (FRONTEX): this is practically a paramilitary institution on European scale, under no democratic control, chasing refugees in the Mediterranean Sea.
Further, next steps :
First, at present the German EU-presidency renegotiate with the US-administration for a new contract concerning the sending of Passenger Name Records (PNR) by the European airlines to the US-ministry of homeland security. The presidency will present the new deal in july 2007. Contentious issues are the change of the pull to the push system, the storage and the number of passenger data.
We decided to analyse the result of the renegotiation and print an information paper on English and French language by the EL.
Second, in preparation of the second EL congress in November in Prague, we have to develop political positions on the question of freedom and civil rights for the further political conception and actions of the party. Therefore we have to collect different political issues in this field and to present the result on the congress. The deadline for first draft paper in this field will be the 1st of July. Therefore will have to start our discussions within the next days.