EU launches counter-terrorism judicial database

BRUSSELS: The European Union’s judicial cooperation arm, Eurojust, launched a shared counter-terrorism database on Thursday that officials said would be "crucial" for judicial action against terrorist suspects and organised crime.

The Counter-Terrorism Register, operational from this month, will give investigators and prosecutors an overview of criminal proceedings made against suspects in other EU countries and in a few, data-compliant partner countries, Eurojust’s chief, Ladislav Hamran, told a media conference.

"Now that terrorists operate more and more in cross-border networks, the EU must do the same," he said. The EU laid the groundwork for judicial data cooperation back in 2005 but the project stalled when some national law enforcement bodies in member states jealously guarded information.

That changed in 2015, when jihadists staged attacks in Paris, killing 130 people in a concert hall, a national stadium and in several cafes, said Frederic Baab, a French former member at Eurojust who helped get the database started.

Suspects linked to those attacks -- claimed by the Islamic State group -- were traced across other EU countries and elsewhere, underlining the "multinational dimension" of such acts, Baab said.