WORLD WORLDWIDE EUROPE UK UNITED KINGDOM - STATEWATCH - issue25/11 - 4 July 2025.

 

issue 25/11 4 July 2025 welcome Dear Statewatcher, Anti-terrorism laws have been used against protest and dissent for decades. Our archives hold examples from the UK, France, Spain and Denmark, amongst other places.  Now, for the first time, the UK government is using terrorism law to ban a direct action group - Palestine Action, which commits property damage to try to halt the export of weapons to the Israeli military. A ban will have serious consequences for the group’s members, as well as anyone expressing support for them - the latter act carries a maximum prison sentence of 14 years. The government’s move has been condemned by civil society organisations, UN experts, lawyers, thousands of people who have protested against it, and the small number of MPs who voted against it. A legal case against the ban is pending, but it is likely to go into effect at 00:01 tomorrow morning, Saturday 5 July. If it is not overturned, the proscription of protest groups may become normalised – just like other measures once seen as extreme, the topic of one of our recent articles. The Prison Officers’ Association once described the use of ankle tags as “associated with either fascist or totalitarian regimes.” Now, they “acknowledge the benefits of electronic tagging.” The normalisation of invasive and dangerous new technologies is also a risk in the realm of ‘predictive’ policing. Our new report shows how these systems, predicated on extensive data collection, reinforce the existing racism and discrimination in policing and the criminal legal system. We also have reports on a political activist’s longstanding fight for justice against Europol and the Dutch Police; a new archive on undercover policing in the UK; our latest bulletin on border externalisation; and much more. These are dangerous times for civil liberties. If you appreciate what we do to stand up for them, please support our work. Chris Jones Director, Statewatch make a donation in EUR >> make a donation GBP >> news Police racism and criminalisation across Europe increasingly fuelled by digital 'prediction' and profiling systems New report reveals how police and criminal legal system authorities across Europe are using data-based, algorithmic and AI systems to ‘predict’ where crimes may occur and profile people as criminals, despite the EU’s apparent ban on so-called ‘predictive policing’ systems in the Artificial Intelligence Act. read more >> EU states demand more migration control cash in next long-term budget  EU member states want significantly more money allocated to migration control in the bloc’s next long-term budget, set to run from 2028 to 2034. This is according to a document produced by the Polish EU Council Presidency and circulated on 12 June. Spending on external migration control from current budgets is already above expectations. read more >> UK: Undercover policing: new archive sheds light on the spycops scandal In 2010, a police spy was uncovered in the UK environmental movement. His exposure set off a chain of events that led the government to announce an official Undercover Policing Inquiry. Now, a new archive gathers all the documents released by that inquiry since public hearings began in 2020. It is designed to help activists continue the fight against political policing and state secrecy, and to push for transparency and accountability. read more >> UK: Electronic tagging: the normalisation of a “fascist or totalitarian” technology Electronic tagging has long been a controversial means of monitoring and restricting the movement of people outside of prisons. The British government is expanding the use of electronic tagging against people with criminal convictions, asylum seekers and migrants. A report from 1989, held in the Statewatch Library & Archive, shows remarkably fierce opposition to the practice from what might seem an unlikely source: the Prison Officers’ Association. read more >> Activist demands compensation from Europol for illegal surveillance A Dutch political activist last week filed a legal complaint with EU police agency Europol, seeking compensation for the unlawful processing and handling of his personal data. The move is likely to lead to litigation at the European Court of Justice to determine Europol’s liability. This case could help clarify the rights of individuals seeking redress against Europol’s growing surveillance and data-gathering efforts. read more >> EU under pressure to cancel data adequacy agreement with Israel Israel's "combination of legal reforms, unchecked intelligence access, and the operational deployment of EU-linked data in repressive practices further undermines the credibility of Israel’s adequacy status," warns a letter to the European Commission signed by 17 organisations, including Statewatch. read more >> "We must build a different future while we can": collective statement calls for urgent change of course A declaration coordinated by the Palestinian Institute for Climate Strategy ties together the crises of border violence and refugee deaths at sea, extractivism and fossil fuel dependence, militarism, Big Tech and corporate power, the genocide in Palestine, and environmental destruction in the Mediterranean. It makes an urgent call for a transformative social, environmental and political alternative. read more >> "Potentially catastrophic" vulnerabilities in EU police and border database Internal audits obtained by journalists show major security vulnerabilities in the EU's huge policing and immigration database, the Schengen Information System. A data breach “would be catastrophic, potentially affecting millions of people,” said Romain Lanneau, a researcher for Statewatch. read more >> what we're watching This is our bi-weekly round up of all the important news, events, and resources we've come across over the last two weeks. Find this resource useful? If so, please consider making a donation to support us. borders and frontiers Hard-right MP sworn in as Greece’s new Migration Minister amid EU subsidy scandal Plevris, 48, is expected to continue Greece’s strict stance on migration. Like his predecessor, he joined the ruling conservative New Democracy party in 2012 after leaving the far-right Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS). Read more. UK’s error-prone eVisa system is ‘anxiety-inducing’ People experiencing technical errors with the Home Office’s electronic visa system explain the psychological toll of not being able to reliably prove their immigration status in the face of a hostile and unresponsive bureaucracy. Read more. Welcome to the European Commission’s Official Deportation Portal We value your opinion—as long as it aligns with our predetermined outcome. Read more. SS and Others v Italy – or doubling down on Banković I am still in shock. The publication of S.S. and Others v Italy on 12 June 2025 was long awaited. After months of work along with the applicants, seven years later, this is a disgruntling result – not only for the applicants, but for the international human rights community as a whole Read more. The first repatriation operation of the Italian government directly from Albania On 9 May, a charter flight left Rome and headed for Cairo with a stopover in Tirana, to bring on board five Egyptian citizens locked up in the Gjadar repatration centre. An operation of dubious legitimacy that the Italian government has carried out quietly. Read more. UK prepares to announce ‘one in, one out’ migrant deal with France Under the exchange, a person being deported from the UK would be exchanged for another individual sent from France who has a right to be in Britain. Read more. Italy and Spain slam France over proposed migration pact with UK Italy, Spain and three other southern EU countries have criticised a proposed Franco-British migration deal, arguing it could leave them having to take back people returned from the UK to the continent. Read more. EU ‘safe country’ and return proposals would seriously undermine protection and human dignity The EU’s recent proposals in the area of migration and asylum risk seriously undermining people’s access to fair and full asylum procedures in Europe. The European Commission’s recent initiatives appear to be interconnected components of a broader strategy to externalise the bloc’s migration management. Read more. Poland to temporarily reinstate border controls with Germany German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said that he had discussed the issue with Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk and that the two leaders want to work together on tightening their borders. Read more coercion and control EU Parliament creates official body to probe NGO funding The European Parliament voted on Thursday to establish a working group to probe European Union funding of nongovernmental organizations, in a victory for right-wing political groups. Read more. UK: Children should not be strip-searched or detained unless a last resort, say MPs Children should not be detained in custody unless arrested for a serious crime and strip-searched only under truly exceptional circumstances, two parliamentary reports have said. Read more. Helping undocumented migrants in Netherlands could soon be a crime Dutch MPs on Thursday (3 July) are set to vote on asylum laws proposed by the far-right Party for Freedom (PVV), including a passed amendment that would make it a crime to help people with no residency status. Read more. Uncovered: UK law firm coached universities on how to obtain ‘sweeping’ protest bans A law firm that helped a UK university obtain a year-long ban on unauthorised protests that could see students jailed for up to two years has quietly coached several others on how to take similar legal action. Read more. Algeria-Switzerland: signature of a bilateral cooperation agreement between the police forces of the two countries It aims to strengthen cooperation between the two police institutions to deal with different forms of crime, including transnational, economic and financial crime, as well as crimes related to illegal migration, trafficking in human beings and drug trafficking. Read more. Spanish authorities failed to protect Venezuelan woman who had undergone a medical procedure without her informed consent The case concerned the removal of Ms S.O.’s nipple and areola, allegedly carried out without her consent, during an operation to save her breasts from cancer, and subsequent court proceedings. Read more. PACE co-rapporteurs warn of ‘tipping point’ for rule of law in Turkey following visit The co-rapporteurs for the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) have warned that Turkey is at a “tipping point” in terms of its democratic standards, expressing serious concern over the politicization of the judiciary, repression of opposition figures and systemic rights violations, following a fact-finding visit earlier this month, Turkish Minute reported. Read more. Switzerland: Police raid journalist’s home under draconian banking secrecy law The International Press Institute (IPI) today expresses alarm over the recent criminal investigation and police raids targeted against Swiss finance journalist Lukas Haessig under the country’s draconian banking secrecy law, which represents one of the most serious attacks on media freedom in the country in many years. Read more. UK: Palestine Action Is Being Banned Because It’s Effective Politicians often ham up their anxieties about popular movements to justify repression, but with Palestine Action, it’s not entirely put-on: the group has struck real fear into the heart of the establishment. Read more. UK: Ban on Palestine Action would have ‘chilling effect’ on other protest groups The crackdown on protest in England and Wales has been ringing alarm bells for years, but the decision to ban Palestine Action under anti-terrorism laws raises the stakes dramatically. Read more. Israel kills innocent Palestinians. Activists spray-paint a plane. Guess which the UK government calls terrorism If Palestine Action becomes a proscribed group, writing these words of support could become a serious offence. It’s vital we fight this alarming attack on free speech. Read more. UK: Banning Palestine Action 'a disturbing legal overreach' by UK Government, Amnesty International UK Chief Executive warns ‘Instead of taking draconian measures to [proscribe Palestine Action], the Government should be taking immediate and unequivocal action to put a stop to Israel’s genocide and end any risk of UK complicity in it’ – Sacha Deshmukh Read more. UK: Home Secretary’s draft order is Trumpian abuse of power “Bundling Palestine Action – a domestic civil disobedience protest group – in with foreign neo-Nazi organisations (the Moldovan ‘Maniacs Murder Cult’ and the Russian ‘Imperialist Movement’) further highlights how unjustified and preposterous the Home Secretary’s proposed proscription of Palestine Action is." Read more. UN experts urge United Kingdom not to misuse terrorism laws against protest group Palestine Action “We are concerned at the unjustified labelling of a political protest movement as ‘terrorist’,” the experts said. “According to international standards, acts of protest that damage property, but are not intended to kill or injure people, should not be treated as terrorism.” Read more. The Commissioner asks the German authorities to uphold freedom of expression and peaceful assembly in the context of the conflict in Gaza Commissioner O’Flaherty raises concerns about restrictions to freedom of expression and freedom of peaceful assembly of persons protesting in the context of the conflict in Gaza, as well as about reports of excessive use of force by police against protesters, including children. Read more. crime and collusion Turkey jails 4 border guards for life for torturing Syrian migrants to death Messages from colleagues from Gaza and the displaced Palestinian students on our campuses have been the driving force for many of us. Read more. UK: Glaring accountability gap revealed in Israel arms case High Court judgment The court stated that it could not find any legal flaws in the government’s decision-making and that certain parts of the challenge were non-justiciable, meaning that they are not matters for the Courts. Leaving the question, who is the UK government accountable to in matters of international law? Read more. UK: Westminster group took cash from Israeli state-owned arms firm Revealed: cross-party group of MPs accused of ‘clear breach of the rules’ over donation from weapons company controlled by Israeli government. Read more. UN rapporteur: Tech firms and corporations profiting from Israeli 'economy of genocide' Francesca Albanese says major tech companies and executives should be held to account in new report documenting profiteering from Israeli 'displacement and replacement' of Palestinians. Read more. Ireland: Central Bank faces legal action over Israeli bonds The Central Bank of Ireland is facing the prospect of a High Court battle over its failure to ban the marketing, distribution and sale of Israeli bonds amid claims that investors could be complicit in genocide in Gaza. Read more. Why academic institutions are cutting ties with Israel Messages from colleagues from Gaza and the displaced Palestinian students on our campuses have been the driving force for many of us. Read more. EU review finds Israel violated trade agreement, but sanctions not expected A major upcoming review of the EU-Israel trade agreement has found that Israel has violated the agreement due to its conduct in Gaza, Middle East Eye understands. Read more. discrimination and racism UK academic body accused of trying to force Palestinian scholar into Israeli court system Toufic Haddad is challenging his dismissal from a UK-funded institute in Jerusalem, alleging discrimination and a deliberate attempt to deny him a fair hearing in British courts. Read more. AI bias in law enforcement: A practical guide This new report from Europol's Innovation Lab tackles the critical issue of AI bias in law enforcement, highlighting its potential harms and providing strategies to detect and mitigate bias. With the EU's AI Act emphasising the need for safe, transparent, and unbiased AI use, this report offers targeted recommendations for responsible AI adoption in law enforcement agencies. Read more. England: Report highlights grave concerns over joint enterprise convictions A new study has raised serious concerns about the use of joint enterprise prosecutions in England and Wales, with researchers documenting the routine charging of individuals with murder despite minimal connection to the underlying crime. Read more. Racial profiling still rife across the EU, Council of Europe says Law enforcement officials across Europe continue to use racial profiling, the Council of Europe's human rights monitoring body (ECRI) has warned. In a report published on Wednesday, the ECRI said the practice — which sees officials act on ethnic background, skin colour, religion or citizenship rather than objective evidence — persists both in stop-and-search policing and at border controls. Read more. resistance and solidarity Mediterranean: 175,000 migrants rescued since 2015 Sea rescue organizations on Wednesday said they had saved 175,000 people from distress at sea over the past decade and called for a Europe-wide, state-sponsored rescue program for the Mediterranean. Meanwhile, a German rescue ship has been blocked from leaving Italy after docking with several dozen migrants on the island of Sicily. Read more. Solidarity with detained MENA human rights defenders in front of European Parliament On 25 June 2025, five human rights organisations held a gathering in front of the European Parliament in Brussels in solidarity with detained women/human rights defenders in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, while calling for immediate action by EU and international human rights mechanisms on this issue. Read more. Ireland: Ministers set out detail of ban on importing goods from Israeli settlements Ministers have set out their proposals to ban the importation of goods from illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Read more. How National Courts Are Keeping International Justice Alive On 16 June 2025, the Higher Regional Court of Frankfurt sentenced a Syrian doctor to life imprisonment for torturing and killing detainees in military hospitals run by the Assad regime. The verdict marks not only a milestone for the families of the victims and survivors of a regime that took over 200,000 lives and forced more than six million people to flee, but also serves as a powerful affirmation of international criminal law. Read more. Activists opened pop-up abortion clinic outside Polish parliament. Opponents threw acid at it Donald Tusk's Polish government has not yet pushed through abortion law reform. In the meantime, opposite the parliament building, feminists have opened an abortion 'clinic', where they face harassment and bullying by anti-abortion activists several times a week — with no protection from the Polish authorities. Read more. secrecy and transparency Europe’s Deregulatory Turn Puts the AI Act at Risk In August 2024, the EU’s Artificial Intelligence Act was adopted after years of relentless negotiations, multiple trilogues, and countless amendments. Only a month later, as the ink on it was barely dry, the AI Act had a target on its back—it had already been named in former European Central Bank President Mario Draghi’s report on the future of European competitiveness as an example of a regulatory barrier onerous for the tech sector. This was only the beginning. Read more. EU: ‘WARNING. Confidential documents. Not to be disclosed to anyone’ This post illustrates some of the general features of how access to documents requests operate with the Commission and the Council today. The second part uses the example of one of my recent requests to illustrate the Commission’s increasing resistance to citizens’ right to access its documents as a way of enforcing public accountability, and how its policy of non-engagement also corrupts access to remedies. Read more. surveillance and snooping Commission plans to equip Europol with decryption technology by 2030 The roadmap is intended to help law enforcement tackle the most serious crime, including child sexual abuse, terrorism, and organised crime. Read more. NHS plans to DNA test all babies to assess disease risk Every newborn baby in England will have their DNA mapped to assess their risk of hundreds of diseases, under NHS plans for the next 10 years. Read more. A Postcolonial Card Cartel: How European Companies Sold Biometric Voting in Africa Biometrics companies see Africa as the ‘ultimate frontier’ — a relatively untapped market, yet to be fully captured. Although there is now a substantial critical literature on identification technologies in Africa and the Global South, little attention has been paid to one set of key actors, namely, the companies that sell the technologies. Read more. Austrian government agrees on plan to allow monitoring of secure messaging Austria's coalition government has agreed on a plan to enable police to monitor suspects' secure messaging in order to thwart militant attacks, ending what security officials have said is a rare and dangerous blind spot for a European Union country. Read more. Security or Surveillance? Climate Activism Under Watch Security or Surveillance? Climate Activism Under Watch in France is a three-part mini-series from Are We Europe, hosted by journalist Seden Anlar. It investigates how artificial intelligence, counterterrorism rhetoric, and state surveillance are being used to silence climate activists, restrict protest, and reshape civic space in France—and across the EU. Read more. war and peace What Big Tech's Band of Execs Will Do in the Army Meta CTO Andrew "Boz" Bosworth and leaders from OpenAI and Palantir have joined a detachment intended to make the US Armed Forces "leaner, smarter, and more lethal." Read more. The dangerous new neoconservatism It is remarkable that many of those who swore never to repeat the mistakes of the Iraq invasion are now set on another misconceived adventure. Read more. UK: They walk among us Introducing Dark Labour: a Labour Party supporting the interests of oil and the military in an epoch of climate crisis. Read more. Germany: Merz sparks backlash at home by saying Israel doing 'the dirty work' German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has caused a stir at home after suggesting that Israel, which launched large-scale attacks on Iran last week, was doing "the dirty work" for the West. Read more. The G7 Statement on the Israel-Iran War: an epitaph to international law and Western values Supposedly the guardians of Western, democratic values and a ‘rules-based’ order, the leaders of the G7 nations’ joint statement on the Israel-Iran War is yet another selective application of international law that makes us all less secure, write Ian Davis and Paul Ingram. Read more. The Israeli/American/GHF “aid distribution” compounds in Gaza: Dataset and initial analysis of location, context, and internal structure This report provides maps, location data, and an initial brief analysis of the Israeli/American/GHF aid distribution compounds rapidly constructed and beginning to operate in Gaza in May of 2025. Read more. Von der Leyen reaffirms dual use R&D plans ahead of EU budget proposal Better links between civilian and military technologies are needed “across the board,” says Ursula von der Leyen. Read more. NATO concludes historic Summit in The Hague On Wednesday (25 June 2025), NATO concluded a historic Summit in The Hague. Allies reached a decision to invest 5% of GDP in defence – laying the foundation for a strong, united NATO in the years to come, and reaffirming their continued support to Ukraine. Read more. Swiss government orders end to Gaza Humanitarian Foundation in Geneva The controversial Geneva-based Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), supported by the US and Israel, is to be dissolved. The Swiss Federal Department of Home Affairs confirmed the news to Swiss public television RTS on Wednesday. Read more. NATO’s 5 percent spending pledge is a threat to people and the planet Last year, NATO spent $1.5 trillion on the military – more than half of global military spending. If members comply with the core 3.5 percent target by 2030, that would mean a total of $13.4 trillion in military expenditure. It’s an impossible figure to grasp, but if you stacked it in one-dollar bills, you could make almost four piles that reach the moon. It could also be distributed as a one-off cash bonus of $1,674 to every person on the planet. Read more. ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ Statewatch 88 Fleet St, EC4Y 1DH, London