WRITTEN QUESTION No. 2721/98 by Leonie van BLADEL to the Commission. Exclusion of the Moroccan dissident Ibrahim Serfaty
C 118/126 Official Journal of the European Communities EN 29. 4. 1999 (1999/C 118/154) WRITTEN QUESTION E-2715/98 by Leonie van Bladel (UPE) to the Council (1 September 1998) Subject: Fear of a crime wave involving the euro Is the Council aware that European intelligence services fear an increase in crime when the euro is 1. introduced? 2. What measures is the Council planning to take to ensure that nothing jeopardizes the security of the euro as legal tender? Is the Council aware that a hologram plate designed to protect the new euro banknote against forgery 3. disappeared without trace on a flight between Paris and Munich? Can the Council give a guarantee that that hologram did not fall into the hands of a criminal 4. organisation and that it cannot be misused? In what way can the Council guarantee that the average European citizen will be able to differentiate 5. between genuine and counterfeit euros? Reply (30 November 1998) The Council would first of all recall its conclusions of 19 May 1998 in which it underlined the importance of the introduction of an effective system of protection throughout the Monetary Union, once euro notes and coins are introduced. Europol will have an important role to play in this field. The Council noted the work undertaken by the Commission to protect the Monetary Union and the euro. Both organisations will continue to cooperate closely with each other and with the European Central Bank, in compliance with the division of powers embodied in the Maastricht Treaty, to develop mechanisms for information exchange and other arrangements to ensure close and regular cooperation to prevent and combat counterfeiting, it being understood that the actual fight against counterfeit notes and coins belongs to Member States. Since then, work at expert level has continued. As part of the wider brief to be conferred on it, Europol will support Member Statesí activities to prevent and combat counterfeiting, in particular counterfeiting of the euro, through improved exchange of information between the relevant authorities of the Member States and the pooling and centralised use of police intelligence. At the same time the ECB (which has sole power to issue euro bank notes) will concentrate on the technical prevention of counterfeiting. The disappearance during transport of a test matrix for hologram production trials on 12 May 1998 will not affect the secure manufacture of euro bank notes. Immediately after the May incident, test matrixes with a completely different design were produced. Bank note prototypes are at present produced on the basis of these new matrixes. (1999/C 118/155) WRITTEN QUESTION E-2721/98 by Leonie van Bladel (UPE) to the Commission (1 September 1998) Subject: Exclusion of the Moroccan dissident Ibrahim Serfaty 1. Is the Commission aware that the Moroccan Government has refused authorisation for Ibrahim Serfaty, a Moroccan dissident who was imprisoned for more than ten years in Morocco and who has been living in exile in France for the last seven years, to return to Morocco?