What does the new law mean for passengers? First of all – red tape. The police will have the right to request from airlines operating flights to Germany information on virtually any non-EU citizen traveling on a particular flight – and the company must provide an answer. And where will it get it if it does not ask the passenger?
So the idea, recently implemented by American officials towards European partners, now returns like a 'boomerang': after all, the US is also not a member of the European Union, so the new rules that the Germans intend to adopt also apply to American citizens. However, it should not be forgotten that during the 'aviation conflict' between the US and the EU over passenger data bound for America, the US authorities quite sharply refused to provide information about their own passengers, demanding that only Europeans fill out questionnaires. So it remains unknown how the White House will react to the German government's plans.
However, the new law is aimed, of course, not so much at identifying terrorists among Americans, but at checking passengers from other countries – mainly, as Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble said, citizens of Pakistan, Turkey, Morocco, and Tunisia arriving in Germany. Moreover, the main 'headache' of the German authorities is not potential terrorists, but potential refugees, asylum seekers. However, in this case it is rather strange to expect them to arrive in Germany in large numbers by plane – this mode of transport is not among the particularly cheap and accessible for refugees.
Be that as it may, the forthcoming law is quite legitimate – it is based on a European directive from April 2004, adopted at the proposal of Spain. According to it, after passenger check-in for flights from countries outside the EU, upon request from the relevant European authorities, the airline is obliged to provide information about a passenger who is not an EU citizen. In particular, the following information is required: name, date of birth, citizenship, number and type of travel document, code number on the registration list, departure and arrival times, number of people traveling together with this passenger, as well as the starting point of his journey.
As can be seen, this entire array lags far behind the American questionnaire, which includes questions such as 'Do you eat pork?' and 'Are you registered with law enforcement agencies of any country?'. In addition, the German police will be required to delete the received data exactly 24 hours after the passenger's landing in Germany – in case they find nothing illegal in it. This also makes the German draft law favorably different from the American rules, according to which all received information must be stored in police databases for six months.
Nevertheless, the introduction of the new law will clearly increase red tape – as well as headaches for airlines. In addition to the extra costs of collecting information (which will most likely be passed on to passengers through higher ticket prices), they risk, if they refuse to provide the listed information, not only losing their license to fly to Germany, but even refusal to accept a particular aircraft already in the air on its way to Germany. Not to mention multi-thousand fines for each 'unchecked' passenger.
However, the EU leadership intends to go even further than the German government. The European Commission, according to Justice Commissioner Franco Frattini, intends this autumn to propose to the EU member states a new directive, completely copied from the one that the Americans 'pushed through' a few months ago – with questionnaires, electronic chips in tickets, and endless answers to questions about pork and terrorist intentions.
Boris ALTNER.
Rosbalt News Agency