En la newsletter de EDRI nos informan sobre el estudio de la Transnational Institute. Se puede descargar el estudio completo en el sitio web de tni (no puedo poner el link directo a la descarga porque ¡¡¡¡usan frames!!! y no hay manera), incluso en castellano, titulado «Manos Arriba».
También lo ha comentado en su blog El Pululante.
Copio aquí directamente el original de la newsletter de EDRI porque pone los pelos de punta.
8. EU pays for surveillance and control technologies
“Arming Big Brother”, a new report by Transnational Institute (TNI) and Statewatch, reveals the army industry lobbying has led to creating a new European security-industrial complex. According to this report, EU is preparing to spend to €1 billion per year on new «research» into surveillance and control technologies.
Following the demands made in 2003 by the GoP (Group of Personalities) including EU officials and Europe’s largest IT and arms companies arguing Europe multinationals needed a billion euros per year to compete with US multinationals and Government, the European Commission appointed a European Security Research Advisory Board to develop and implement the future European Security Research Programme (ESRP).
Ben Hayes, the author of the report stated “The ESRP is completely unaccountable and gives multinational corporations an unacceptable role in EU decision-making. This is contributing to a European security agenda in the corporate rather than the public interest…”
This claim is supported by the fact that 24 projects have already received funding from the Commission out of which military organisations and defence sector contractors are leading 17 of them. Another 10 projects deal with research into high-tech surveillance systems.
The big four European arms companies have a combined annual revenue of around 84 billion dollars, not far off the total EU budget. The author of the report raises the question of whether the European citizens should therefore pay the bill for the research of these companies.
Although some of the projects funded under the ESRP have a legitimate objective focusing on radio-nuclear fallout and the protection of critical infrastructure, the majority of these projects “deal with surveillance and the development of military technologies of political control offering little guarantee as far as ‘security’ is concerned”.
The report argues that rather than facing serious threats like terrorism, environmental degradation, climate change, diseases or other types of
insecurity, the ESRP is part of a EU strategy “focused almost exclusively on the use of military force and new law enforcement technologies. Freedom and democracy are being undermined by the very policies adopted in their name.”
There is already clear evidence that new law enforcement technologies, unless under strict control, can damage civil liberties. The EU legislation on the introduction of biometrics into passports and travel documents raises serious privacy concerns. This creates an alarming image of a Europe in which everybody is registered and fingerprinted, in which communications and movements are monitored and in which this control is rather imposed by “military force rather than civilianconsent”.
Arming Big Brother makes an appeal to civil society to resist the development of the security-industrial complex and the militarization of the EU. Its author expresses his hope that the report may contribute to a larger campaign against EU militarism and that independent groups will continue to monitor the development and implementation of the ERSP.
Press release – Arming Big Brother: new research reveals the true costs of Europe’s security-industrial complex (25.04.2006)
Arming Big Brother The EU’s Security Research Programme (04.2006)
