It has been again a little while, but the story is the same: this Monday The EU Council is set to give US intelligence services full access to SWIFT banking data, despite an unanimous call by the European Parliament not to do so.
“The move of SWIFT the data server to Switzerland would be an excellent opportunity to stop the nearly unlimited access of US authorities on EU bank transactions. But EU justice and interior ministers are apparently keen [on agreeing to] a deal as soon as possible, on 30 November. Why 30 November? Because one day later, on 1 December 2009, the EU’s Lisbon Treaty will be in force and would allow the European Parliament to play a major role in the negotiations of the deal with the US. A deal one day before will be a slap in the face to democracy in the EU. … [W]hile the US will be able to access EU banking data, no access to US banking data by EU [authorities] is being foreseen.”
Great such one-sided bank privacy.. 5 Reasons why it is bad.
Update: Dutch Government given answers aren’t much transparant, nor explain the text change, which is now proposed for signing.
In other news, thought the secret jails of North-Korea and EU were unique, off course not.
