Member states step up aviation-security talks

EU member states have begun debating whether to ban liquids and laptops on board airlines, increase screening of passengers and introduce a system of profiling passengers using their biometric details.

Aviation security experts from all 25 member states met in Brussels yesterday (30 August) to discuss the list of options put forward in a document by the European Commission. On Tuesday (29 August) airline and airport representatives met the Commission to discuss the possible measures.

The national security experts will reconvene on Wednesday (6 September) to make recommendations to the Commission which will then propose measures to transport ministers at a meeting in October.

While the UK, France and Germany are understood to be in favour of increasing controls at airports and on aircraft, other member states are said to be opposed to very restrictive options.

The Association of European Airlines (AEA), which attended Tuesday’s meeting, said it would like to see security measures harmonised so as to minimise disruption to passengers. AEA’s Françoise Humbert said a risk assessment was needed to examine the need for EU-wide security measures. The airline industry was not in favour of banning liquids on board, she added.

The proposals follow the security alert at UK airports on 10 August when items allowed on board were restricted to passports and wallets. A meeting of the Finnish, German, Portuguese, Slovenian, French (the current and future EU presidencies) and UK interior ministers took place in London on 15 August when the EU-wide security measures were proposed.

In addition €350,000 funding for research on liquid explosives was announced, as was a commitment to examine ways to restrict internet access for terrorist groups and sites which explain bomb-making. The Commission will also propose a European system of collecting data on airline passengers travelling into the EU before the end of the year. A Green Paper on detection technologies, such as camera surveillance, is to be published shortly.

Some proposals are likely to be controversial, in particular positive profiling which involves passengers providing personal and biometric information in advance, allowing them to pass through security quickly once their fingerprints or irises are scanned. A Commission spokesman said it was unlikely to be brought in across the EU but it "could be part of a whole arsenal in the fight against terrorism".

Dutch Liberal MEP Sophia in ’t Veld said she was concerned about the implications for different ethnic groups. "What are the chances if you are a 25-year-old Pakistani man with a beard of becoming a ‘trusted traveller’?" she asked.

n The EU is on course for a transatlantic row about privacy over demands by the US for more information on European airline passengers to be submitted at an earlier stage with the possibility of sharing it among different US agencies.

In an article published in the Washington Post this week Michael Chertoff, the US secretary of state for homeland security, complained that the EU had prevented passenger data from being passed on to different homeland security departments, immigration or customs bodies, or the FBI. "European privacy concerns have limited the ability of counterterrorism officials to gain broad access to data of this sort," he wrote.

The EU is currently redrafting its passenger data transfer agreement with the US that was struck down by the European Court of Justice which ruled in May that the wrong legal basis had been used. The challenge was brought by the European Parliament over civil liberties concerns, an issue not raised by the court in its judgement.

The redrafting is under way and is scheduled to be in place by the court deadline of 30 September, after which the original deal expires. But the deal, as originally envisaged, will be renegotiated in full in January when US demands are expected to be put on the table.

EU member states have begun debating whether to ban liquids and laptops on board airlines, increase screening of passengers and introduce a system of profiling passengers using their biometric details.