eu4journalists

Justice - Home affairs

2. Fundamental rights

Issues

• Enlarging Schengen area to new member states
• Protecting citizens rights while fighting terrorism and crime

Respect for human rights, democratic institutions and the rule of law have always been an integral part of the idea of Europe. The Charter of Fundamental Rights, adopted in 2000, encompasses all the personal, civil, political, economic and social rights and freedoms EU citizens enjoy. It also addresses new issues raised by technological progress, such as data protection and bio-ethics.

EU Treaties protect the free movement of people, ban all discrimination, enshrine the right of residence throughout the EU for all its citizens and allow them to vote and stand in local and European elections in every member state. Special focus has been given to the rights of the child.

The 1985 Schengen Treaty aimed to create an area where individuals could travel freely from country to country, and was signed by five EU members: Belgium, Germany, France, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. It was subsequently adopted by most other member states, along with Iceland and Norway (as the five Nordic countries had their own tradition of frontier-free travel), and finally came into force in 1996.

The UK and Ireland have not removed frontier controls but participate in the “Schengen Information System” SIS - a huge central database open to police forces and immigration services, making it easier to track criminals. The member states supply information to the system through national networks (N-SIS) connected to a central system (C-SIS). This IT system is supplemented by a network known as SIRENE (Supplementary Information Request at the National Entry), which can be described as the human interface of the SIS.

The Schengen Information System has been operational since March 1995, when checks at internal borders were abolished for countries participating in the Schengen cooperation. Given the progress made in the meantime in the area of information technology, it has become necessary to develop a new system with more advanced functionalities and based on cutting-edge technology. With this system it will also be possible to connect other member states.

The Council accordingly adopted two legislative instruments in December 2001, making the Commission responsible for developing SIS II. Pending SIS II becoming operational, December 2006 gave its endorsement to the SISone4all project (a project of the member states coordinated by Portugal). SISone4all is a temporary solution designed to connect nine new EU member countries (Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovenia, Slovakia and the Czech Republic) to the existing version of SIS1+ (with some technical adjustments) in order to allow them to complete the Schengen evaluations as soon as possible.

Enlargement of the Schengen area

The Justice and Home Affairs Council of 8 November 2007 came to a unanimous agreement to extend the abolition of internal border controls to nine of the new member states of the European Union (Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovenia, Slovakia and the Czech Republic) as of December 2007.

The decision on extending the Schengen area has been taken following a detailed assessment, lasting two years, which the pairs of other member states carried out on the new member states' level of readiness. The evaluation process has proven that the countries concerned are sufficiently prepared to apply both the non-SIS-related provisions of the Schengen acquis as well as its SIS-related provisions in a satisfactory manner. On this basis, the preconditions have been fulfilled for the lifting of internal border controls at land and sea borders as of 21 December 2007 and at air borders as of 30 March 2008.

Bulgaria, Cyprus, Romania and Switzerland are expected to play a full part in the Schengen acquis in the years to come. Ireland will be able to participate in the Schengen area on the same terms as the United Kingdom whenever it wishes.

The European Agency for the Management of Operational Cooperation at the External Borders (FRONTEX) develops cooperation between member states in the field of management of external borders, assists in the training of national border guards and carries out risk analyses.

The some five million non-EU citizens working in the Union also have important rights. Common procedures have been drawn up to cover issues such as family unification and migrant workers.