UN Anti-Terror+CoE Anti-Crime Directors Smith +Kleijsen to EuroFora: Human Rights + Spying v. Terror

*Strasbourg/CoE/Angelo Marcopolo/- Almost at the same time that US President Obama faces controversrial Denunciations of alleged spying on AP Press Agency Journalists' Phones in relation to a Terrorism prevention case of the recent Past, and about political targeting against Tea Party dissidents in Fiscal matters concerning their Revenues, etc., UNO and CoE co-organize, together with the Swiss and American Governments, an exceptional 2 Days long International Conference on new Legal and Technological developments about "Special Investigation Techniques" in the fight against Terrorism and other serious Crime, with the participation of the EU, OSCE, CIS and the Arab Ligue, etc.

The Swiss Permanent Representative to the CoE, Ambassador Charles-Edouard Held, who is also CoE's Committee of Ministers' coordinator on all issues of Legal Cooperation issues among its 47 Member States (Russia and Turkey included), but also 6 Observer States (USA, Canada, Mexico, Japan, Israel, the Holy See, etc), speaking to "EuroFora", stressed the need to "find efficient ways to combat Organized Crime and mainly Terrorism, but also to ensure respect of Human Rights and Rule of Law standards".

CoE has officially defined as "Special Investigation Techniques" any means by which Public Authorites could search Information in order to Fight Serious Crimes, as Terrorism and/or other forms of Organized Crime, without that being known by the concerned people.

 The only common characteristic of such "Techniques" is that they "aim.. at gathering Information in such a way as Not to Alert the Target Persons", and this should be done only "by Competent Authorities", "in the Context of Criminal Investigations", and "for the purpose of Detecting and Investigating Serious Crimes", but also related "Suspects", according to Chapter I of CoE's Committee of Ministers' Recommendation No 10, adopted on April 2005.

CoE's activities on Terrorism and more generally Organized Crime issues emerged mainly around September 11 (2001) massively Deadly Attacks against innocent, ordinary People, but also in the contect of former Chechnyan extermists' Terrorism, etc.. Apparently partly reduced since CoE's 2005 Summit in Warsaw focused on its main activities about "Human Rights, Democracy and Rule of Law", it surfaced anew particularly after the recent Terrorist Attacks by Deadly Car Bombings in Boston (US) by Chechen Islamic Extremists who had reportedly arrived to North America via Turkey, followed by the latest explosions in a Turkish village close  to the Syrian Border and reportedly full of Syrian Refugees as well as Rebels, some of whom had recently quarelled with the Turkish Security forces, the Majority of Inhabitants in that area being from the Alaoui (as controversial Syrian President Assad himself) or Alevite Minorities.

- Experienced CoE's Director on Information Society and the Fight against Crime, Jan Kleijssen stressed to "EuroFora" that on 2013 their is currently a need to Update Legal Standards and  Criminal Investigation Techniques, taking into account various important recent Developments on New Technologies' possibilities and the way that they can be used in real practice, beyond the initial measures which had been taken in this field by the CoE until 2005.

- In this regard, the competent CoE's Anti-Terrorism Coordinator, and Head of Action against Crime in general, Ivan Koedjikov, who  presented at the International Conference particularly the "Challenges put by Emerging Technological Developments and their Use", while not excluding such eventual possibilities in the foreseeable future, said that he wasn't yet aware f.ex. of any concrete and already available Technology on Human Brains' Monitoring, despite several  Research breakthroughs anounced recently in Medicine, Optics, EM. Waves, etc., but considered that New Tehnical Instruments, mainly "on Capture, Storage and Analysis of Internet Data" : F. ex., even by simply collecting a person's "Likes" and/or "Dislikes" at his Facebook account in order to guess even his/her Sexual preferences, etc.. Moreover, various recent developments on "Sensors and Algorithms" might also enable the Police f.ex. to find out whether a CarDriver is abusing of Alcool even from a certain distance, without opening and searching the car, etc...

+ However, "Special Investigation Techniques" is a concept which can include a wide variety of instruments and methods, as also, f.ex., making a fake Drug Delivery to Traffickers just in order to find out how it will circulate inside their Network and various points of contact, etc., while after the recent Boston (US) Terrorist Massacre even the now "classic" but systematic use of CC-TV proved to be very useful, almost indispensable into searching and finding the main Terrorists Suspects, the brothers Charnaev, observed to "EuroFora" the Keynote speaker of this International Conference, the Director of UN Security Council's Counter Terrorism Committee, Mike Smith, from Australia.

But he also didn't exclude a priori a possibility, perhaps in the foreseeable Future, of also other eventually discovered New Techniques, perrhaps, f.ex. on Brain/Behavior Monitoring/Transparency from a certain distance, well beyond the Remote Thermic Sensors already used succesfully by US Authorities in order to  discover where was Hiding the only survivant among the Boston Terrorists, etc., and  even agreed with "EuroFora" that it might became necessary also to Protect People, particularly such as Judges (and their Family), Politicians, Journalists, NGOs, Activists, etc., from possible Risks of abuse of some Modern "Special Investigation Techniques"  by Oppressive Rogue States, Corrupted Officials, Organized Crime Networks, or even individual Criminals, Terrorists, etc. who might Target them in order to serve their Criminal aims in the Future, (f.ex. Spying, Manipulation, Aggression, Kidnaping, Murder, etc), even if such problems yet "go beyond the scope" of the present (2013) Conference, as Smith carefully replied to another "EuroFora"s question.

- Meanwhile, what is more important now is  : (A) to better fix Human Rights' Legal standards on the Special Investigation Techniques in today's situation, and - even if Terrorism and other Organsed Crime Networks have often a Global impact, as UN SC TT's Director observed, noting, f. ex., that even from far away Australia (his own Motherland), "we had Victims at New York's WTC back on 2001, at Bombay's Terrorist Attacks on 2009, and even during London's bombings of 2005" - (B) to use the opportunity of this International Conference in Strasbourg, which brings Together 3 Regional Organisations : CoE, OSCE and the Arab Ligue, in order to develop a close Cooperation between them, the competent UNO's Director told "EuroFora".

+ Apparently the ball was driven home on this GeoPolitical point by another Keynote Speaker of the Conference, Mounin EL-Fassi, Head of Counter-Terrorism at the Arab Ligue, who stressed from the outset, in his speech at the Plenary Session, that, while we must all avoid errors in this field, which can be abused for "Propaganda by Terrorists", nevertheless, the Arab Ligue is interested into "developing adequate Legislation and Investigative Techniques to prevent serious Crime", where we "need to be at he Cutting Edge" of Legal and Technical Standards and "take stock of Progress" made recently, so that, "while, of course, Respecting (both) the Law and the Sovereignity of all States", (a particular point traditionaly interesting f.ex. Russia and other European Countries, etc), nevertheless, there is a "general interest of Arab States", which "Need Technical Assistance, a good Training", concerning all those measures related to the Judicial System and other Techniques, as he pointed out.

Even if, according to some other observers, there might be, perhaps, some Differences of Views to bridge between certain Arab Countries, nevertheless, certain other qualified Speakers of the Conference, such as f.ex. Spanish Head of Technical/Operational support  of the National Police, Dr. Luis Valles, who intervened in particulatr during a Session specially dedicated to "the Internet and Telecommunications", told "EuroFora" that, in his view, Internet Service Providers, under New Legal Measures which could be taken in the forseeable Future;  should become responsible for provisionaly Storing not only Content Data, but also Traffic (Connexion, i.e. IP, etc) Data, which could serve to find out Criminal Networks' concrete contacts, etc., so that  Prosecutors could ask Judges to lift the general Protection of Personal Data for the needs of Investigation of Serious Crimes,. I.e. practically suggesting to go beyond a relevant 2006 EU Directive, which had ben practically decided after some initial disagreements were finaly Lifted immediately after the 2005 London Bombings, during the UK Presidency of the EU.
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However, it was rather astonishing to find out that, apparently, the UK  (despite its general interest particularly on Digital/Internet issues), didn't send any Representative at this  UNO-COE International Conference, neither Iceland (recently a slef-declared Champion on Internet Freedoms, etc), nor  Norway (origin of CoE's Secretary General Jagland), or forthcoming EU Chair (for July-December 2013) Lithuania, even Interpol, and several Key small-medium EU/CoE Countries, (as, f.ex. Cyprus, Lichtenstein, San Marino, Monaco,  Denmark, Portugal, SLovenia, Georgia, Albania), while Greece, Slovakia, Serbia,  a.o. were rather under-represented, (something, nevertheless, rather usual in such kind of events).

But, on the contrary, Turkey came No 1 among simple participant States at this Anti-Terrorism Conference on Special Investigation Technoiques in the Number of Experts invited to assist : Seven (7), Qatar had send 3 Experts from Doha, as well as Japan, Sweden, Poland, Ukraine and Tunisia, etc. Azerbaidjan 2, same to Spain (who, in fact, had, in afddition, several Experts as specialized Speakers : comp. Supra), Germany, Italy,  Hungary and Montenegro, up to Uzbekistan, and even  Saudi Arabia, Mongolia, Canada, Bosnia, Kyrgyzstan, Morocco, Jordan, and ... Belarus and the Holy See, (etc) were represented in the International Event, naturally including also Big Countries as France, Russia, USA, etc., while Switzerland was a keen and almost omni-present co-Organizer of the entire event, (comp. supra), also attended by large International delegations from the CoE itself anbd UNO (institutional co-organizers), together with the EU, OSCE, EUROJUST, the CIS, GUAM, Arab Ligue, etc., i.e. apparently ensuring a wide Regional and partly Global impact.

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