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UK and Sweden veto espionage talks between US and Europe
- mtgx 13y agoI wonder what they have to hide...
- mhomde 13y agoSweden passed a pretty extensive wiretap law in 2008, it wouldn't come as a great surprise (in these days) if they share information from that program with the US http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FRA_law http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FRA_law
- Spearchucker 13y agoSweden isn't alone in this - the UK also vetoed the investigation. This investigation is one of two, the other being into data protection and EU citizens' right to privacy, which will go ahead. http://m.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/05/us-blocks-espionage-talks-europe-nsa-prism http://m.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/05/us-blocks-espionag...
- lostlogin 13y agoThe veto is such a blunt tool. How the hell is it helpful? It seems anti democratic and very dictatorial to me.
- cannabis_sam 13y agoThey send stuff from their FRA-wiretaps to NSA for decryption, and NSA has 'promised' to send back what the US think that sweden need to know. This shit is absolutely disgusting, but the foreign minister of Sweden, Carl Bildt, is known to cream his pants whenever he get attention from the US, so it's not surprising.
- dmarusic16 13y agoCome on, people. Every developed country with a budget with the possible exception of Germany is doing the exact same thing as the US. It would be irresponsible of them not to.
- linohh 13y agoGermany is doing exactly the same. We have strong wiretapping laws, eg the G10-Gesetz which not only allows covert tapping but also data transfer to foreign intelligence agencies. No warrant required if national security is motivation for the tapping. Merkel is lying to everyone because elections are coming this September. I would not be surprised if they knew about NSA data collection before the Snowden leak.
- linohh 13y agoWhat a big surprise, Germany knew and cooperates. http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/edward-snowden-accuses-germany-of-aiding-nsa-in-spying-efforts-a-909847.html http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/edward-snowden-acc...
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- ownagefool 13y agoWhen you say developed country you probably actually mean every large developed country, I suspect quite a few of the smaller ones don't bother. While free trade and open borders are a great thing, I often wonder if smaller countries is the way to go for the world.
- _k 13y agoI disagree. What's wrong with needing a warrant ? Right now, they don't need a warrant and I bet it's already causing problems for some people because government employees misbehave when you give them a grey area like that. That's just a fact. And you're not gonna hear about it because people are powerless. They can't react to it because it will get them in more trouble. Those who say that isn't true are the ones who haven't experienced it or are the ones taking advantage of others in similar ways. And what makes it even worse is that the governments store all the data for years, maybe even decades. History has told us this is going to become a huge problem. For a lot of people. We may not live long enough to experience what can happen but it's just a matter of time. And this generation is responsible for it.
- skurmedel 13y agoSigh... I'm sorry... I voted for these assholes a long time ago.
- cseelus 13y agoAfter their hefty wiretap law of 2008, the strange circumstances of the 2010 allegations against Assange and now this, it seems to me that their ties with US intelligence and administration are tighter than many swedish citizens realize.
- doe88 13y agoI really didn't know they were so much aligned on US positions.
- skurmedel 13y agoOlof Palme was pretty outspoken against the US, but that was a long time ago. The government has been in bed with the US for as long as I've been alive at least; sometimes at odds with the general public.
- etiam 13y agoThis is very interesting, especially in the light of the coup-like conditions that surrounded legalizing the FRA mass surveillance. However, this source is a populist extreme right newspaper. It has low credibility and regularly carries antagonism against the democratic parties. Can we have an independent, credible source verify the claims?
- mhomde 13y agohttp://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/05/us-blocks-espionage-talks-europe-nsa-prism http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/05/us-blocks-espion...
- GHFigs 13y agoThe slug says "us-blocks-espionage-talks...", while the actual title is: "UK blocks crucial espionage talks between US and Europe."
- drsintoma 13y ago| Swedish media chose not to report on Sweden's actions Can you confirm if this part is true?
- mhomde 13y agoThis seems to be false and fria tider doesn't seem to be the best of sources, even if the gist of the story is true. There are articles online in at least three major newspapers (aftonbladet.se, svd.se, dn.se)
- petriw 13y agoBoth DN and SvD have reported on it: http://www.dn.se/ekonomi/sverige-uppges-ha-stoppat-spionsamtal/ http://www.dn.se/ekonomi/sverige-uppges-ha-stoppat-spionsamt... http://www.svd.se/nyheter/utrikes/sverige-dras-in-i-spionskandal_8326772.svd http://www.svd.se/nyheter/utrikes/sverige-dras-in-i-spionska... It's not big news however.
- jfaucett 13y agoI would be very interested to know what a swede has to say about this. My general impression of Sweden (at least sitting here in Germany), is that it is a liberal minded country by european standards - that is that in general the scandanavian countries are on the forefront as leading examples of how modern societies should behave. This article seems to imply the opposite, why would Sweden veto this unless they have some serious spionage going on themselves? For me, it also makes the assange affair seem more dubious than before as if Sweden were basically following US mandate.
- speeder 13y agoSweden have done other... weird things. For example, during the H1N1 vaccinations, a Finland woman that had some good credibility, pointed that the Sweden vaccines were dangerous, she claimed that Sweden had some sort of conspiracy with the US to get rid of young people. Lots of people believed it was balooney at the time, but now we have Swedish young people with narcolepsy because of the vaccine (it only affected those below 20). Now the balooney claim, look a lot less balooney... But I still wonder what the hell is going on sometimes... All of my ideas fail both henlan and occam razors, but maybe there IS some conspiracy really going on...
- mortehu 13y agoDid anyone in Sweden claim that the vaccines weren't dangerous? The point of vaccines is that they're less risky than the disease they're preventing, even considering the low likelihood of contracting a disease.
- speeder 13y agoSince the 70s seemly all mass vacinations related to H1N1 caused more damage than the disease itself. H1N1 spreads fast, but is not much deadly anymore. Here in Brazil for example, H1N1 infected a good part of the population, but only about 100 people died, while common flu killed 100 people each day. And the H1N1 vaccine also caused some mayhem. I am not dismissing vaccines in general, or saying that even a dangerous vaccine is not worth it (the original vaccine, was very dangerous, yet made a disease get erased from Earth), but there was people saying specifically that the H1N1 vaccine that only Sweden used, was clearly dangerous for young people, too bad those people had no proof... But now that the vaccine DID caused more damage than the disease.
- pfortuny 13y agoThis is another example of the real life ungovernability of the EU in relevant things. On the other hand they pass a lot of truly relevant laws like a new one concerning the minimum distance of chickens in egg-farming plants in 2012: just in the middle of the crisis, Greece, Ireland &c. We are so happy here...
- gahahaha 13y agoI believe in the idea of a united Europe, but it is hard to see how we can get to there from here. Right now it is a bit like a Polish parliament ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_parliament_%28expression%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_parliament_%28expressio... ) in that a small country that has a particularly stupid government at the moment (or that can be strong-armed or corrupted by an empire like the US) can block sensible reform. And we all know how well Poland did when they were unable to make any decisions....
- Yossarian_Lives 13y agoI think people forget that the EU exists somewhere between Federal-style government (the US for example) and pure international organisations (The UN, etc). You can look up where its sole and shared competences lie in articles 3 and 4 of the treaty that established it, but it's not a long list and mostly concerns the operation of the common market (the free movement of goods, services and people) and a grab bag of smaller roles. The tension inherent in that set-up is between the individual powers of sovereign nations and the collective policy of the group. In this instance, there's no doubt that Sweden and the UK are helping the US in vetoing, but there's a parallel concern that the EU does not have competence to negotiate on this, and I imagine a strong desire to prevent mission creep. As to the broader question of ungovernability - I'd argue that the really interesting question is whether it is possible to maintain a firewall between economic policy and everything else, which is what arguably distinguishes the EU from other forms of weak federalism. Even before the Euro crisis there were edge cases where economic jurisdiction bled into, for example, social issues (the ECJ ended up having to effectively rule on Irish abortion law under the free movement of services). Now it's even worse. Political parties in Greece and Ireland, for instance, have been co-opted into austerity policy by having the gun of exiting the Euro held to their heads. At that point the questions of the EU's democratic deficit and the sovereignty of its smaller members becomes more pressing. At some point, I suspect, the EU membership (Euro members especially) will find itself forced to pick between actual federalism and supra-nationalism.
- moondowner 13y agoWell, it's a special relationship after all. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Relationship#Intelligence_sharing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Relationship#Intellige...
- sentenza 13y agoTo me as a supporter of the European Project, the entire thing is heartbreaking. We now have two crises that could possibly be the defining "history book moments" of our century badly mishandled by the "leaders" of Europe. The UK managed to stop the EU from speaking with one voice so that each little country now has to send its easily ignorable complaints by itself. Good job. Today is the day that I, as a continental European, have become a supporter of a swift EU exit for the UK. Trojan horses not welcome.
- doe88 13y agoNote I wouldn't exclude that such a move would also satisfy my own country (France). I think the hypocrisy of our governments is maximal.