The New York Times dropped the news over the weekend that French people don’t want to pass their own version of the Patriot Act, despite recent terrorist attacks and a rising terror threat. The Times says that the French see the Patriot Act as a "fearful overreaction to 9/11" and don't want to make the same mistake.
Here is an excerpt from the Times story, "Patriot Act Idea Rises in France, and Is Ridiculed":
After shootings last week at a satirical newspaper and a kosher market in Paris, France finds itself grappling anew with a question the United States is still confronting: how to fight terrorism while protecting civil liberties. The answer is acute in a country that is sharply critical of American counterterrorism policies, which many see as a fearful overreaction to 9/11. Already in Europe, counterterrorism officials have arrested dozens of people, and France is mulling tough new antiterrorism laws.
The problem with the Times piece is that France has had its own version of the Patriot Act for nearly a decade, and in many ways French authorities have even more license to intrude on the lives of its citizens.
Contrary to the Times description of France as "a country that is sharply critical of American counterterrorism policies," the French have been spying on suspected terrorists for years. Here’s a description from Foreign Policy’s "How The French Fight Terror" in 2006:
In the United States, revelations that the Bush administration mandated domestic spying have caused a political uproar. France, however, has been spying on its citizens for years, as part of its effective, albeit controversial, counterterrorist system.
"The French blend of aggressive prosecution, specialized investigators, and intrusive law enforcement is unique in Europe," it says in FP.
FP also says that France used "extended police powers to monitor mosques" and then would "expel those deemed too dangerous."
New legislation passed in 2005 increased "police surveillance methods, especially video and communications," and "French police are entitled to check the identity of any passerby in France without justification."
In the United States, a district court judge must approve any surveillance request. Not in France. Prosecutors there can authorize wiretaps themselves.
Here, from the Hudson Institute, is more on the expansive authority given to French authorities by their Patriot Act:
Other parts of the bill facilitate police access to personal data, such as license plates, credit cards, and identity cards. Phone companies and Internet cafés will have to keep computer data information for one year, an initiative to be applied among all European Union members. Police will keep tab on citizens traveling to certain countries known for their links to radical Islam, such as Pakistan, Afghanistan, Sudan, and Iraq. Finally, a provision inspired by the British after the London bombings greatly increases video-surveillance in public spaces, such as airports and train stations, as well as radical mosques and bookstores.
The rights given to the police in France under the name of fighting terror are expansive, but according to the Hudson Institute, the French thought the trade was worth it.
"While all these proposals are criticized by human rights organizations as damaging to civil liberties, a substantial majority of the French public supports giving up some of their liberties in exchange for greater security," it writes.