21 August 2001 08:46 GMT+1

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EU's secret network to spy on anti-capitalist protesters

By Stephen Castle in Brussels

20 August 2001

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Leading article: Police co-operation must not trample on

protesters' rights

European leaders have ordered police and intelligence

agencies to

co-ordinate their efforts to identify and track the

anti-capitalist

demonstrators whose violent protests at recent

international summits

culminated in the shooting dead by police of a young

protester at the Genoa

G8 meeting last month.

The new measures clear the way for protesters travelling

between European

Union countries to be subjected to an unprecedented

degree of surveillance.

Confidential details of decisions taken by Europe's

interior ministers at

talks last month show that the authorities will use a

web of police and

judicial links to keep tabs on the activities and

whereabouts of protesters.

Europol, the EU police intelligence-sharing agency based

in The Hague that

was set up to trap organised criminals and drug

traffickers, is likely to be

given a key role.

The plan has alarmed civil rights campaigners, who argue

that personal

information on people who have done no more than take

part in a legal

demonstration may be entered into a database and

exchanged.

Calls for a new Europe-wide police force to tackle the

threat from hardline

anti-capitalists were led after the Genoa summit by

Germany's Interior

Minister, Otto Schily. Germany has long pushed for the

creation of a

Europe-wide crime-fighting agency modelled on the FBI.

Germany's EU partners rejected Mr Schily's call, judging

that a new force to

combat political protest movements was too

controversial, but ministers

agreed to extend the measures that can be taken under

existing powers.

Central to the new push is the secretive Article 36

committee (formerly

known as the K4 committee) and the Schengen Information

System, both of

which allow for extensive contact and data sharing

between police forces.

Under the new arrangements, European governments and

police chiefs will:

* Set up permanent contact points in every EU country to

collect, analyse

and exchange information on protesters;

* Create a pool of liaison officers before each summit

staffed by police

from countries from which "risk groups" originate;

* Use "police or intelligence officers" to identify

"persons or groups

likely to pose a threat to public order and security";

* Set up a task force of police chiefs to organise

"targeted training" on

violent protests.

The new measures will rely on two main ways of

exchanging police

information. The Schengen Information System, which

provides basic

information, and a supporting network called Sirene