Juan Ignacio Zoido believes greater cooperation in the fight against Jihadi fighters is essential

2017.3.27

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At this meeting, Juan Ignacio Zoido told his European partners within the G-15 that the threat of terrorism "is constant and no country is unaffected". The Spanish Minister for Home Affairs recalled that the European Union has been working for some time on a raft of measures related to the fight against terrorism and that "persevering on their effective application is essential".

Juan Ignacio Zoido said that, from a legislative point of view, "huge strides" have been made in the European Union during the first few months of 2017 in terms of the fight against terrorism through the approval of various instruments, such as the Directive on Combatting Terrorism, which updates older European legislation. This Directive requires all Member States to adapt their criminal legislation to the fight against Jihadi terrorism and the new methods being used (such as propaganda and recruitment on the Internet), and the Directive on Control of the Acquisition and Possession of Weapons, which will strengthen the control of legally-owned weapons in order to prevent illegal access and trade by criminals and terrorists.

During his speech, Juan Ignacio Zoido said that Spain believes greater cooperation with Turkey and achieving increased and more effective collaboration with this country in terms of Jihadi combatants is essential.

As regards the fight against radicalisation, Juan Ignacio Zoido stressed that various actions are being carried out at a European level within the European Radicalisation Awareness Network (RAN) and the so-called Ministerial Internet Forum, which engages with institutions and private companies to remove extremist content from the Internet.

The Spanish Minister for Home Affairs believes that support for the RAN "is essential" for the development of rehabilitation and reintegration programmes in Member States and that it "rather relates to a field where action is needed from those social services, care authorities and other institutions operating beyond the scope of home affairs".

The G-15 Home Affairs Ministers welcomed the support from the European Commission for the PNR (Passenger Name Records), as well as the financing of projects that will enable an effective exchange of data between the Passenger Information Bureaus of Member States and the practical application of this Directive as soon as possible.

Juan Ignacio Zoido recalled that the amendments to the Schengen Borders Code will come into effect on Friday 7 April, allowing for the conduct of systematic controls on all persons at external borders. Unlike before, this will include control of those with a right to free movement, thereby enabling terrorist movements to be more effectively controlled.

Migration policies at the JHA Council

The Spanish Minister for Home Affairs, Juan Ignacio Zoido, highlighted the importance of maintaining a comprehensive focus on the migration foreign affairs policy of the EU, underlining the importance of African cooperation not only in the field of readmissions but also in the fight against people trafficking networks (such as the Joint Investigation Teams - Niger Joint Investigation Team headed up by Spain) and the surveillance of both land borders (which will be boosted under the Spanish GAR-Sahel project) and maritime borders (which will receive technical support from the Spanish Mediterranean programme 'Seahorse').

In this regard, the Spanish Minister for Home Affairs emphasised the essential nature of support for European institutions and the institutions of other Member States in obtaining involvement from Algeria, Tunisia and Egypt in the Mediterranean programme 'Seahorse'.

Juan Ignacio Zoido also defended the programmes run by the World Migration Organization (WMO) on assisted voluntary return from the African countries of transit to countries of origin and the need to support the solutions offered by the WMO to facilitate these procedures.

He also recalled that Spain is one of the largest contributors to FRONTEX operations. Juan Ignacio Zoido explained that, besides the personnel and technical resources included in these operations, "Spain's efforts to control its borders go much further than that".

The Minister for Home Affairs said that Spain maintains a firm desire to continue the relocation and resettlement processes as measures based on solidarity. To date, 878 people have been transferred to Spain within the framework of these relocation commitments: 734 people from Greece and 144 from Italy. The Minister for Home Affairs announced that he is willing to relocate a further 600 people, for which a commitment has been made to 200 people per month (175 from Greece and 25 from Italy).

Juan Ignacio Zoido recalled that Spain has always expressed its commitment to the European resettlement agenda as a legal and organised way to manage the arrival into the EU of people in need of international protection, thereby avoiding endangering their lives. In this regard, he said that Spain has taken in a total of 289 resettled refugees so far: 232 from Lebanon and 57 from Turkey. Juan Ignacio Zoido announced that this figure will increase over the coming weeks with the upcoming resettlement of 195 refugees from Turkey, the first of which - a total of 61 Syrian citizens - will arrive on 30 and 31 March.

Fight against organised crime

The JHA Council approved its Conclusions containing the measures that will be applied by Member States and European institutions in the fight against organised crime for the period 2018-2021. Priority areas for action will be defined according to the lines set by the European Threat Analysis of organised crime, and multi-strategic annual plans and operational plans will be applied to each one of the crime areas identified.