New call to suspend ‘safe harbour’

New call to suspend 'safe harbour'MEPs have demanded the suspension of the “safe harbour” agreement – which allows data sharing between the EU and US – following the Prism-gate scandal.
The pact has been under review since the Edward Snowden revelations first emerged last summer but now the European Parliament’s Civil Liberties, Justice & Home Affairs (Libe) committee has backed a report that calls for the “immediate suspension” of the framework.
It is also calling for the Parliament to withdraw its support for a new EU-US trade deal until the US resolves privacy concerns.
More than 3,000 US businesses are signed up to the framework, but the Snowden leaks prompted the Commission to carry out a review of the safe harbour regime last year, and in November it published a report which cited “deficiencies” in how the safe harbour framework works.
The Commission made 13 recommendations that it said would address its concerns. EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding last month followed up on November’s report by calling on the US to take “legislative action before the summer” to address the concerns. She threatened to suspend the safe harbour agreement if the US failed to do so.
But the issue is further complicated by moves to make a new agreement part of an EU-US trade deal. Talks on the contents of the new Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) began in July.
The Libe committee has now echoed calls made last year by Reding to avoid the issue of data protection being put up for negotiation as part of the TTIP talks. It said the Parliament should refuse to approve any trade deal with the US until such time as the US “fully respects fundamental rights enshrined in the EU Charter”.

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