SWIFT: An affair which concerns you
SWIFT: Remember this acronym, because it refers to an affair which concerns you! SWIFT is a private corporation based near Brussels through which passes every transaction effected between some 8000 banks from more than two hundred countries. In doing so the company collects millions of items of personal date covering all of the customers concerned.
In 2006, the American press revealed that the US authorities were accessing these data illegally and clandestinely. This scandal caused an outcry throughout Europe. The justification put forward by Washington – the war on terrorism – was not sufficient to allow this gross violation of the right of each citizen of the European Union, to have his or her privacy protected, to be accepted. No fewer than four EU directives, as well as the Charter of Fundamental Rights, and even a European control authority – which brings together France's CNIL and comparable national commissions – are supposed ensure the scrupulous respect for this democratic guarantee.
The European Commission then thought to overcome this obstacle by negotiating with its partner across the Atlantic a draft agreement to give, after the event, a legal basis to these illegal practices. But the European Parliament, at the time, refused to endorse this text and made known the conditions which would have to be fulfilled in order to obtain its agreement. One could only applaud! That was last February 11th.
European and American negotiators had, from then on, no choice other than to review their copy, promising to take account of the objections of the Strasbourg parliamentarians. A new version of the accord was signed on 28th June. Though it signalled several developments, it remained, on a number of essential questions, totally unacceptable to anyone who was attached to the idea of safeguarding public liberty, including in the context of the fight against terrorism.
For example, the principle of the transmission of millions of items of data dubbed “potentially interesting”, and not only data concerning such and such an instance of clearly identified terrorism, was maintained. Another example: the European authority charged with controlling operations was not a public and independent judicial authority, but a police agency (Europol!). Final example: the agreement did not even exclude the possibility that some of these data might be transmitted by the American authorities to repressive services of third countries! More generally, one searched in vain in this “compromise” for a definition, clear and acceptable to Europeans, of what might be meant in this case by “terrorism”, and still less for any proof of the necessity for the struggle against this scourge of the transmission – followed by the retention for five years! - of this mass of data.
Despite this, the majority of MEPs failed to show, on this occasion, the same firmness demonstrated last February, when they voted against. All of the political groups, with the exception of the United European Left (GUE-NGL) and the Greens in the end lined up 'wisely'. This 8th July they transformed, respectively, their fine action of last February 11th into what had simply been a last ditch stand. Should things be left there and the page turned on SWIFT? I think not. I will return to this subject.
Francis Wurtz is former president of the United Left Group in the European Parliament, the GUE-NGL This article first appeared in French in the daily L'Humanité, and in translation on the website L'Humanité-in-English
