Europol HQ opened
01 March 1994
On 16 February the new Europol offices in the Hague were formally opened by Dutch Minister of Justice Mr Ernst Hirsch Ballin, who spoke out in favour of a rapid expansion of Europol.
Of the European Drugs Unit (EDU), the first unit to be set up, he said that the Liaison officers of the 12 EU states: "can request the information which is required for current investigations in their own country. They can consult the national police files in their own National Unit. As long as there is no convention, all of the member states keep control over the information themselves, for assessing the legal requirements for exchanging information with other countries". The Convention on Europol, which is still being drawn up, would: "give Europol the authority to set up a central European intelligence database. Europol could then be considered as a kind of European Criminal Intelligence System", said Dr Ballin.
He went on to advocate establishing "our own European Law Enforcement Network" in the longer term and "common investigation teams" in the short term.
However, the deputy director for Police at the Ministry of the Interior, Mr De Graaf, said in a speech at a symposium on Europol on 23 February in Amsterdam that he did not feel Europol should take on a role in coordinating police investigations. Europol, he said, was an information-collecting, processing and distributing body with an acquired expertise on organised crime. Mr De Graaf also said there was still a lot to be arranged in terms of statutory footing and effective parliamentary control, for which he suggested the establishment of an interparliamentary commission. Professor Rter told the symposium that personal sources had told him that the German police were preparing a detailed proposal for legal and judicial standardisation along the lines of the German model as a basis for establishing a network of Europol branch offices throughout the EU. This goes far beyond the present remit of Europol. Germany takes over the Presidency of the EU in July and therefore the lead role in setting the agenda for initiatives in the field of justice and home affairs.
At present Europol and the EDU is only authorised by a ministerial agreement (signed in Copenhagen in June 1993) pending the presentation and ratification of a Convention on Europol. The Convention will not be ready for ministerial signature until the autumn (under the Presidency of Germany). Conventions have to be ratified by the parliaments of each member state which is a lengthy process. For example, the Dublin Convention on asylum seekers, agreed by the EU Ministers in 1990, will not be ratified by the 12 parliaments before the end of 1994 (see Statewatch vol 3 no 6). No date has yet been given for the presentation of the Convention on Data Protection which will govern the exchange of information between states under the Conventions on Europol, External Borders Controls and the European Information System (EIS). It is therefore hard to see how both of these Conventions are going to be in force before the review of Title VI of the Maastricht Treaty (justice and home affairs) is due to be completed by the end of this year.
EDU
Europol is presently headed by German senior BKA officer Mr Juergen Storbeck, who is considered to be a hardliner. Second-in- command is Belgian Gendarmerie Colonel W Bruggeman, judged to be more moderate. Mr Storbeck is soon to return to the BKA and France has put forward a candidate to take over. Unfortunately, the French candidate appears to speak no English, which could be a handicap. Another French problem is the firm "Europol", which is in the business of producing and selling polyester and therefore claims the brand name.
The total budget for the EDU is 2 million ECUs, half of which is for personnel and half for equipment and costs. The central staff, excluding the liaison officers from each country (the UK is sending five officers, police and customs), is 18 (including fo