The PES would like to underline the good understanding between the European Parliament and the Council during the negotiation process, as well as between all major parties at the European Parliament.
PES President Sergei Stanishev said: “I truly welcome the PNR directive because it will make our countries more secure by helping us to fight organised crime and terrorism. And I am proud that our safeguards on data protection have been fully incorporated into the directive because we, as progressives, say no to massive surveillance of EU citizens. We support targeted, risk-based use of passenger data”.
European socialists have always seen PNR as an important tool to fight organised crime and terrorism. But we also want to stress the importance of enhancing cooperation among member states under the current rules.
Stanishev said: “The more information we share, the stronger we will all be because terrorism has no borders, our intelligence sharing must have no borders. It is obvious that any information related to national security is highly sensitive, but I call all on member states to overcome their reluctance. The PNR alone will not solve all of our security problems and it will not be implemented overnight. But it is a positive first step towards enhanced investigative and intelligence cooperation between European Member States”.