Proposition 54K2043

Projet de loi modifiant la loi du 30 novembre 1998 organique des services de renseignement et de sécurité et l'article 259bis du Code pénal.

General information ¶

Submitted by

MR Swedish coalition

Submission date

Sept. 20, 2016

Official page

Visit

Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

protection of privacy data processing secret service public safety personal data terrorism data collection

Voting ¶

Voted to adopt

CD&V Vooruit ∉ Open Vld N-VA MR VB

Voted to reject

Groen Ecolo PVDA | PTB

Abstained from voting

LE PS | SP DéFI PP

Party dissidents ¶

• Siegfried Bracke (N-VA) abstained from voting.
• Olivier Maingain (MR) abstained from voting.
• Stefaan Van Hecke (Groen) abstained from voting.

Contact form ¶

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Discussion ¶

March 16, 2017 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

Mr Van Hecke, rapporteur, refers to his written report.

A number of speakers are registered, but I see few, except Mr. Van Hecke.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Minister, colleagues, we have had the opportunity to welcome the Minister of Defence in the Committee on Justice. This made us virtuous.

I will keep it quite brief, because I think we had a good discussion in the committee and used an excellent method. We have organized hearings with people who have something to say about it, we have done a first reading and, as is customary in the Justice Committee with important texts, we have also done a second reading with useful corrections. That resulted in an excellent report, so that everyone knows well what points of discussion were all there.

A number of technical changes have been made following the evaluation by various services.

There are also a number of changes that are more than just technical in nature. The exceptional methods are no longer excluded from the phenomena of extremism and interference, specific exceptional methods can be applied from and from the Empire, the ADIV can use specific methods abroad and the high urgency procedure for the specific method is adjusted, which is always delicate when it comes to exceptional or emergency procedures. Furthermore, there was the discussion of the BIM committee, the establishment of an intervention team, notification obligations – a very important discussion that we conducted because the Constitutional Court also destroyed on the basis of an earlier provision in the original law – and so on. A whole series of changes. In addition, there was also the law on archiving, which did not belong at all there. You know, Mr Minister. We have conducted this discussion and colleague Hellings will go deeper into it later.

One can, of course, study and analyze every measure or change contained therein in detail. You know that we are quite critical of the law on special intelligence methods, but I can also say that it is necessary. We will not say that it is not necessary or should not be used.

I think the discussion is very important because we provide a legal framework for the intelligence services, the military intelligence service and the State Security.

Any method can be discussed, but what is especially important to me is that when discussing and applying it, one always takes into account a number of very important principles, such as opportunity, subsidiarity, proportionality of the means – which means are used to ⁇ which goal – that a number of fundamental rights that we have and privacy are always taken into consideration. Such weighing is always difficult, but nevertheless there will constantly be a need to find a proper ratio between these principles. Therefore, I am not saying that I like this method or not. After all, in certain circumstances a method may be good, but in other circumstances I may be of the opinion that it cannot or should not be used because it is not proportionate in a particular situation.

The essence of the discussion is actually to be able to check whether sufficient control is possible and will be after amendment of the BIM Act. That is the essence. If we know today that with the expansion of this law there will also be an expansion of the control capabilities or that the services, the BIM Committee or the Committee I, will be sufficiently able to control all new methods that will be used in the field, then that is a reassurance. If we come to the conclusion today that they are not able to do so, then that is a problem.

It is therefore good that the Committee I has given an opinion. That advice is well known to you. It covers about five pages and it didn’t reassure me. The conclusion of the Committee I’s opinion, at the end of the last paragraph, is as follows: “In summary, it can be concluded that the supervision as it currently exists and is exercised by the Permanent Committee I must also be able to process this legislative amendment, but that in the medium and longer term the way the renewed powers are exercised by the services, the additional tasks of the Committee I and the increasing complexity of the dossiers, the capacities of the Permanent Committee I will be challenged.” From the government, of course, you will say that this is the power of Parliament. After all, Committee I depends on the Parliament, it is the Parliament that sets the budgets, so if there is a need for an expansion of technical resources or of personnel, that is our responsibility.

Mr. Speaker, you will find in us a partner to ensure that the supervisory body actually gets the resources it needs to carry out those checks.

We started this discussion this week.

That is essential. Of course we will also need to ask for money, we will need some cooperation from the government. If control can be guaranteed, both technically and by means, then it will be a law that provides a balance. I think that with the introduction of the BIM Act and the BIM Commission you have also seen that after some time a kind of legal practice arises, so that the State Security and the military intelligence services know very well what they should and should not do. The BIM committee has developed legal practice and one knows what to follow. That is a good thing, that are the checks and balances that are included in this law.

Of course, there are also some crucial new elements in the law, such as the cable tap. Mr. Minister of Defence, you know that we should be vigilant about this abroad. There is a risk of mass capture. You say that the law provides for conditions. For example, one must work with a list and one should not necessarily do mass capture. Here it comes again to the point that the competent services can carry out the checks to see whether one follows a listening plan or not, whether one complies with the legal conditions or not.

In short, cable tape, we are not a big fan of it, but if all that can be specifically controlled on the ground, and carried out by people with the necessary qualifications and technical resources, then it can be a good tool with which a balance can be found. The prerequisite is, of course, that there is sufficient technically qualified personnel.

The creation of the intervention team is also something entirely new, which we must pay attention to. The functioning of this service will also be supervised by the Committee I, which will have to apply legislation effectively applicable to police services, in accordance with the Law on the Police Office. In fact this is a specialty of the Committee P. But well, the Committee I will have to do it.

There is also the discussion on the notification, following the notification of the Constitutional Court on the earlier provision. The Constitutional Court has actually said that an active notification must take place. The government has chosen a passive notification. The question then, of course, gentlemen ministers, is whether the Constitutional Court, when it must again take a decision on this matter, will accept it.

Until then a few elements.

I will not repeat everything I said in the committee. Everyone can read this perfectly in the report. Of course, we are also not happy with the chapter on the archives, but as I just said, my colleague will intervene specifically on that.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Ministers, dear colleagues, the text on which we will discuss today is of paramount importance, since it substantially changes the Organic Law of Intelligence and Security Services, with new tasks and new powers conferred on the State Security and the General Service of Intelligence and Security of the Ministry of Defense (SGRS).

The hearings conducted within the Justice Committee and the evaluations conducted revealed that some adjustments and improvements needed to be made. This is done. The assessment of this legislation is positive. It will be noted that provisions have been taken to enable State Security agents to perform their work in safer conditions.

However, as I have had the opportunity to remind you in the committee, it would have been better to wait for the recommendations of the commission of inquiry, since the government does not present any reason of urgency justifying anticipating these issues. For example, the separation between judicial authorities and intelligence services remains still blurred. In this regard, the results of the work carried out by the investigation committee would have helped to remove some uncertainties. We have somewhat anticipated a job that may have to be done again in a few months. This is the truly regrettable aspect.

The hearings and discussions also revealed that some provisions of the bill went far too far. This bill tends to adapt the law in the face of technological evolution, which I consider positive. Nevertheless, these improvements must go hand in hand with legal guarantees in a democratic society, that is, with proportionate, balanced procedures that meet a legitimate goal.

Our intelligence services must, of course, have the necessary tools to fulfill their tasks. We advocate in this regard. On the one hand, the attacks that our country has experienced have sufficiently demonstrated that the safe whole cannot be the absolute answer. It is important that our Information also plays a role in prevention.

On the other hand, a security policy without the human and budgetary resources for the SGRS and for the State Security is futile. Can the additional tasks in which the Information will be invested be accomplished with such limited means? We are concerned about this. The R Committee was also very concerned about this.

We can take a simple example: the strategic vision of Defense provides means for the Intelligence dimension, which would somehow become a full component of our defense. If this development is essential, we question the fact that many resources seem to be devoted solely to the ISTAR battalion.

Mr. Vandeput, you discussed yesterday with my colleague Pirlot in the National Defense Committee. In this context, I would like to be clear on this point, we are not questioning field intelligence, "in boots" as it is said in the jargon. This is essential for the safety of our operations and our military personnel abroad. On the other hand, my group is questioning the fact that no more comprehensive reflection on the Belgian intelligence community is taking place. ISTAR would be better inserted and controlled in the Belgian intelligence community, as is happening at the level of Security and SGRS.

Our assembly seems to be very poor when it comes to controlling the work of ISTAR. It is in this sense that we have questioned General Testelmans and you, Mr. Minister Vandeput, several times, without receiving a real answer. This is obviously regrettable. In this regard, the bill provides for new methods and capabilities, including territorial, for the SGRS. The military programming law unfortunately only confirms our concerns about this; this bill misses the car by refraining from integrating the strategic vision. On the contrary, I fear that it accentuates the grey zone of functions and missions specific to everyone, within the Belgian intelligence services, whether civilian or military.

The exhibition explains the reasons why the project does not affect the guarantees provided to protect the fundamental rights of citizens, nor the various controls.

Let me point out to you, gentlemen ministers, that by changing the rules of observation and technical means by shifting exceptional methods to specific methods and by providing for the application of less protective methods abroad, you obviously affect the fundamental rights, as well as the guarantees intended to protect them.

These democratic guarantees can be preserved if a balance is found between, on the one hand, the needs for operational skills of our intelligence services and, on the other hand, the preservation of the fundamental rights and freedoms of our citizens. In this case, this goal is still not met. Specifically, agents will be able to use the technical means, such as the film, at any time without the control of the BIM Commission.

The new criteria used for filming are also based on unverified and uncontrollable evidence. And so the new notion of "place inaccessible to the public is not deprived of sight", instead of "private place" has the effect of making accessible for observation some parts of the home without the permission of the BIM Commission.

It is normal that home walks are protected by necessary safeguards, as long as they are an integral part of the home. Moreover, with this notion, privacy protection will depend on real circumstances, which do not apply to each citizen, since some homes will be better protected than others based on a simple location configuration, which will be different from one home to another. The added value of these methods is also questionable by the simple fact that their application will raise more problems than it will solve.

Extreme emergency procedures are simplified to allow agents to take action even faster. And, if we conceive that services should be able to act quickly, it is necessary at least to define a deadline within which a confirmation must occur. Currently, we have enough technological means to require a written track as fast, such as a SMS or email, for example.

Despite these few difficulties, I would like to emphasize the quality of the legislative work that has been provided in committees, thanks to which the mentions for authorisations are now prescribed with barely nullity. This is the positive point and the improvement that has been made in the commission. This is an additional guarantee that is essential and is now introduced in this project.

The project also creates new methods by which the SGRS will be able to operate abroad. It will now be possible to intercept communications, take pictures and enter a computer system abroad.

The SGRS has always had functions transferred abroad. It is therefore not shocking that these missions are confirmed in this sense. On the other hand, these new methods are not surrounded by the necessary formal and procedural safeguards as there is no assessment of the principles of proportionality and necessity. The government justifies this flexibility by referring to the fact that communication with Belgium is not always possible and that it is more complicated from abroad. Like the Council of State, I consider that this argument is unfounded; such data collection can be carried out from Belgium.

Regarding the notification system, the government unfortunately does not take into account the comments made by both the State Council and the Constitutional Court. They recalled the need to establish a system that allows persons who have been subject to surveillance to be informed. However, the project provides for a passive notification system, which only works at the request of the person, and under far too restrictive conditions. The alternative solutions proposed by the BIM Commission were, unfortunately, not taken into account, as they were precisely able to reconcile the rights of the data subjects and the needs of the investigation. How can it be required as a condition of admissibility that the person provides evidence proving his personal and legitimate interest while, by its very nature, the methods are applied in the greatest secret? This condition is obviously incompatible with the secret nature of methods.

Finally, the reform of the archives of the intelligence services that allows the services to constitute their own archives until they are destroyed raised serious questions. Under pressure from archivists, the now amended draft provides that intelligence services are exempt from transferring to the State Archives documents less than fifty years old, while currently, the deadline is set at thirty years.

However, the extension of the deadline is not justified both for historical reasons and for scientific reasons. The Ministers of Defence and Justice have not given any objective reason that could justify the extension of the period from thirty years to fifty years. In addition, the decentralization of archives into multiple services will not facilitate the work of our researchers.

While certain aspects of the text allow the SGRS and the State Security to better fulfill their tasks that are essential, given the current difficult context related to the terrorist threat and the geopolitical realities, we nevertheless believe that this text sometimes goes far too far in terms of infringing on the privacy of our fellow citizens. Furthermore, it is not part of a comprehensive reflection on the Belgian intelligence community which must be equipped with the necessary human and budgetary resources to carry out an ad hoc democratic control. The intelligence constellation is therefore, in our view, not an option because it will not ⁇ the set goals.

This is the reason why my group will abstain from voting on this bill.

For the discussion of the current BIM legislation, I return to the attacks. Then each party stood in front or on the banks, wherever, to shout loudly that also the intelligence services should be given more strike force, that they should be able to act better and better protect our people and our people.

This is obvious, and this is happening today with this bill. We said we would change something. The government does that too. We are now trying to expand the powers so that the intelligence services can do their work better. They did their best, but so far, unfortunately, this has not been the case. Think of the technological developments to which the legislation, as previously proposed, was not adapted. Now it happens. In addition, we all know that our researchers, at Justice and the intelligence services, must comply with a number of rules and procedures. Terrorists should not do that. They just do up. Therefore, the researcher always leaves with a certain delay.

With this legislation, within the framework of the necessary safeguards and checks and balances, it is intended to recover that delay for a large part and to be able to work well. They will now be allowed to listen to certain targets, for example, also outside our national borders. Until today it was not allowed. There are exceptional methods of investigation that can now also apply to threats, including in extremism, allowing to check banking transactions also in that context. Previously it could not. There is now an urgent procedure to be able to act very quickly. Imagine a very acute situation, in which one has to wait four days for the authorization for a phone call. Now it will be possible to act much faster. For me it is also very important that this draft authorizes ADIV to anticipate, advise and ensure that, when they are there, everything can be done in safe conditions. I also think of third-party assistance. Even small things, like screaming a locker, could not. Today, thanks to this design.

Our intelligence services will get more strike power. This is very important in order to avoid attacks in the future and to protect our people.

I found on the banks an amendment from Ecolo-Groen on the archive. I have also read and heard a lot about the archive, but I am more concerned about the protection of people than about an archive. It is good that comments are made, but not all are correct. It is not taken away from the public at all. The number of visitors is concerned. One should not argue that this is not the case. There is also an automatic declassification. In that context, the VSSE and the ADIV will have to be constantly – they are small services – engaged in declassing. I would much rather have those services engaged in protecting our people. That is what I count on.

Mr. Speaker, in reference to the last intervention, in what way, Mr. Speaker, the amendment to the Law on Archives allows to increase the capacity to fight terrorism? Absolutely nothing ! This is proof that the amendment of this Article 51 is something that came far beyond the issues of fighting terrorism or changing the way our intelligence services operate in the fight against terrorism.

The fact that today intelligence services, whether the State Security or the military intelligence service, can keep an archive for at least fifty years before having to pay it to the General Archives of the Kingdom does not strictly change anything in their ability to improve the fight against terrorism. Absolutely nothing !

My speech will be brief, Mr. Speaker. I would just like to clarify that, as regards the archives, the most inadmissible and most aberrant aspects of the original Article 51, before it was amended by a majority amendment, have now disappeared. It is recalled that at the beginning of our discussions on this article 51, we talked about the creation of a service of historical archives for the State Security and for the intelligence service of the army, which is totally contrary to the principles of good governance that want to gather the archives in one and the same place.

And then, there was also the idea that the intelligence services could have asked other federal state services, to which the State Security and the military intelligence services had transferred data, archives, the destruction of documents. I think of the police, in particular. It was discussed that the intelligence services could ask other services to destroy these documents, which is totally contrary to a golden rule in archives, namely respect for the integrity of the fund. From the moment a document is transferred to a local police or to the federal police, even if the document originally comes from the intelligence services, this document belongs to the local police, to the federal police. And, if security measures should be taken to ensure that this document does not end up in nature, it was unacceptable that the State Security or the military intelligence service could have that legal capacity to ask the police to destroy this document. It was unacceptable. This has disappeared.

In the parliamentary debate, both the Minister of Defense and the Minister of Justice were heard to open or enter open the door to the idea of creating, in the future, an automatic declassification of documents currently classified after a certain period, which is a certain opening in relation to the way Article 51 was written at the beginning of parliamentary work.

There remains a real problem, which emerged when the new majority amendment to Article 51 was deposited. Today, both intelligence services have a period of fifty years before their archives are automatically transferred to the General Archives of the Kingdom.

I have a question for the Minister on this.

This period of fifty years shall run from the date of the document or from the time when the document was used for the last time, i.e. from the time when the document no longer has an administrative utility.

Take an example, Security has data on the Killers of Brabant. The investigation is still ongoing. Will any data on this investigation be declassified fifty years after the occurrence of the Brabant Massacres where when the State Security will no longer need this document?

This question of time is important because we have a lot of archives in our intelligence services that relate to painful periods of our history. Now, researchers must now, but especially in the future, have access to primary resources to understand what happened.

For example, it is crucial for our researchers to have access to the documents to understand the events that led to the independence of the Congo. It is undeniable that the independence of the Congo occurred in 1961, that the presence of Belgium in the Congo ended in 1962. Therefore, we have largely exceeded the fifty-year deadline. Remember that recent news has shown us that our intelligence services were especially keen to put these essential documents at the disposal of researchers to conduct their research and establish history. The State Security, for example, repatriated documents from the Colonial Security of the SPF Foreign Affairs to the Security while those documents should have been transferred to the General Archives of the Kingdom. Another example: the intention of the Army Intelligence Service to move to SPF Foreign Affairs, where they are now stored, the archives of the Congolese Public Force, namely the Congolese army and police embryo. These archives are de facto not made more easily available to researchers since they are not transferred directly to the General Archives of the Kingdom.

This proves that the archives that are linked to our intelligence services are now the subject of special attention of our intelligence services. They act openly or through the band to prevent them from being paid where they should be after the specified period, i.e. fifty years: within the General Archives of the Kingdom and made accessible subject to compliance with the law of 11 December 1998 on classified documents.

It is indispensable that these archives are found there in the General Archives of the Kingdom accessible to the general public and, in particular, by the researchers who will have to establish our history. This is why we have the greatest fears, but I look forward to the response that both ministers will want to give to the questions I have just asked them.

I was asked a question. I will answer immediately.

One wants to have one’s own archive where everything is in, instead of having to transfer the documents to the Reichsarchive. This does not mean that the archive will be less accessible and that researchers will no longer be able to handle it. They can do that. It is accessible. Every year a lot of people come there. There is no need to pretend that this would not be the case and that a move to the Reichsarchive would be better. Furthermore, I think that given the location of the Rijksarchiv the security there is less efficient than in the own service.

Finally, you ask what the reform on archiving contributes to the safety of the population. Well, there is a lot of information coming inside from many services, including from other countries. If adequate security cannot be guaranteed, our security services will no longer receive that information. If they no longer receive that information, they will no longer be able to adequately protect us. That is why it is so important.

Madam, I live right in front of the General Archives of the Kingdom. This is a neighborhood that works very well. I have been able to visit the archives myself and the security is ⁇ well assured there. We are talking about archives that are more than 40 years old. How does this affect national security? In what ?

On the other hand, I find that the history of the murder or controversial death of Dag Hammarskjöld, the former UN Secretary General, has never been established. Why Why ? Because these data are kept secretly by the Belgian, British, American and South African intelligence services. This is the reason!

These are archives that concern dead people, members of the State Security or military intelligence services that are no longer of this world, Madam. We have the right, in a democratic state, when something happened, to know it. When the UN came to investigate the death of Dag Hammarskjöld, it could not have access to the archives of the State Security and the military intelligence service, and our government did not put the UN researchers on the right track to find these documents.

I think it is urgent that Belgium can face its history, otherwise it will not be able to assume it.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Ministers, I think the project makes sense in that we know well that organized crime always has a technology ahead of our intelligence and security services. In this, adapting our legal texts to all its relevance.

We would have gladly followed the text of the government despite a few questions regarding the proportionality not always adequately met between the legitimate interests of the protection of privacy and the needs of an effective protection of public security.

But what will eventually lead my group to abstain from this text is because the provisions on archives have been attached to it in a somewhat unfortunate way. We just talked about it, a quite unfortunate distinction is introduced between the classical archives, which are paid to the General Archives of the Kingdom according to well-coded and accepted procedures of all, and the archives relating to security operations in the broad sense.

The deadline is increased. There are different procedures being developed and, as I have had the opportunity to say in the committee, it is a pity. Indeed, a democracy honors itself by allowing generations that have not directly participated in decisions or non-decisions, to learn, appreciate or grasp situations that have been experienced by our country and to be able to go and look for this information and this information in the archives.

To impose, as you would like for these documents, a period of fifty years, to take the risk of eventually seeing them declassified or even disappear, is not acceptable in a State that wants to honour itself with the ability to explain why, at moments of troubled periods of our history, certain decisions were made.

If you aviez eu la sagesse, comme on you l'avait suggéré, the retirer cet élément du texte, nous aurions pu vous suivre. Eu égard au fait que vous avez voulu le maintenir, même et l'amendant, nous nous nous abstiendrons sur le texte.

Of course, we will not support this bill. Many of the measures of this scheme that are applied today do not focus on efficient processing of the available data in a targeted and democratic way in the fight against terrorism. We have conducted this debate many times.

One of the provisions in the bill extends the powers of the security services: the simplified infringement on the privacy of Belgian citizens. The increase in their powers would require the BIM Committee and the Committee I to monitor more activities, but they do not have the resources to do so. We have already pointed out this many times. Effective control of security services is therefore jeopardized. In our view, this is not good news for the protection of citizens, but it can also make the malfunctioning of the intelligence services or the poor communication between different services less noticeable. This also implies the risk that our services will become less efficient and that there will be difficulties in targeting the detection of real threats. Last year, on February 2, the PVDA submitted a bill to strengthen democratic control. Here we see that the opposite happens.

For our group, this policy is very problematic. The PVDA has repeatedly stressed that the measures are inefficient, especially because the government continues to refuse to do anything to address the structural causes of terrorism, such as waging wars abroad – often from purely economic motives – or the sponsorship of terrorism by countries such as Saudi Arabia.

Despite the fact that the majority parties continue to emphasize it, the principle of proportionality is not ⁇ ined in the bill. One of the measures in the draft allows for the recording of listened communications for not one, but ten years, without giving any motivation for that measure. Also, forcing third parties and transport companies to cooperate violates various democratic principles and may even allow the involvement of civilian infiltrators. Similar to the proposal on the professional secrecy of social workers, which was recently adopted, the present draft makes it easier to abolish the professional secrecy of doctors, lawyers and the source secret of journalists.

Dear colleagues, our group believes that we must find a balance between the privacy of people and the fight against terrorism. This is not ⁇ ined today. That is why we will vote against the bill.

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Van Hecke, on the notification obligation that we constructed after the destruction of the previous one, we have debated in the committee extensively. We have demonstrated that the notification obligation, as it is designed in the European context, should be best seen.

You are also concerned about the fact that the Committee I is responsible for overseeing the Intervention Team. As I explained to you in the committee, a number of police officers are deployed to the Committee I’s Investigations Service.

As regards Ms. Özen’s questions, I refer to the answer I gave to Mr. Van Hecke on the duty of notification.

Regarding the criterion of "place not accessible to the public" and the question of whether, yes or not, this place is visible, I think we have sufficiently answered it in the committee. We had specified that this remains a specific method that requires a prior notification to the BIM Commission.We believe that it is sufficiently monitored in terms of custody.

These are the few answers I wanted to give, Mr. Speaker.

I now give the floor to my colleague of Defence, Mr. Vandeput.

I will give you the word, if you wish. That is why I am here!

I apologize infinitely, I will not do it again. We are a team, Mr. President.

All my congratulations, Mr Minister! I am delighted!

Dear colleagues, Mr. Van Hecke has already quoted it during the discussion of the present bill, it meets the questions we have asked.

Ms Özen, you refer to my strategic vision. Indeed, we have found that we are lagging behind in terms of our intelligence services. Therefore, two things are needed. That is, first, a substantial investment in resources as well as in people, and, secondly, a clear legal framework within which those services can perform their tasks. In that sense, it is very important that we not only regulate a number of matters very clearly and give a number of possibilities given the evolving technology, but above all that we are very clear about the checks and balances, the mode of control, which is linked to it.

Mr. Van Hecke, I have very well taken note of your concerns about that control, including the impact of the Committee I. We have discussed this in detail in the committee. For instance, I have pointed out that cable taps must always be linked to a specific listening plan that is submitted ex ante to Committee I and the implementation of which is monitored ex post. Thus, all these matters are now very clearly regulated, which finally provides legal certainty for security personnel, ⁇ for their activities abroad.

Mr. Hedebouw, you would have better read the texts once, then you would have determined what I said: the controls have become clearer and more uniform and there is more guarantee of good control. There are certain things that are difficult to understand in laws. There is common sense, even in the business. When we talk about proportionality, it is up to the stakeholders and their superiors to make choices, choices to which the law clearly gives grounds.

To summarize a long story, I note that, in terms of content, except for the concerns about control – which is why we have also said that we will evaluate this law permanently – there are actually few remarks regarding the methods themselves and that the opposition is clinging to strohalms in connection with ISTAR, Ms. Özen, or the archives of which Mr. Hellings is a heavy pioneer.

Madame Özen, one of my predecessors belonging to your party, might, ⁇ , explain to you what the ISTAR battalion is. You mentioned the components. The above-mentioned battalion is an integral part of the Earth component. It is in no way related to the SGRS, neither at the level of the components, nor at the level of the budget, nor at the level of the command.

If there is a problem, I would like you to discuss it with your socialist colleagues. Yesterday, in commission, I promised that I would organize an ISTAR battalion visit specifically for the members of the PS group because I think they do not have a good idea of the capabilities and tasks of the above battalion. I hope you will join us when we visit him. It is not so far away since it is located in Heverlee.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Minister, it is true that after almost a year, you finally invited me, yesterday, to visit this battalion. With you, pleasure comes from waiting. It is true that you were very upset because we had discussed your program law on future military investments. I can understand that my request for second reading did not accept you.

Mr. Hellings, you are asking a question on the level of archives. I know you like to discuss archives that are thirty years old or older. I prefer to look into the future and do what is right for our intelligence services.

In response to your question, I would say that with regard to the deadlines, it is specifically mentioned in the text that it is at the time when a file is no longer of direct use that it is paid to the archives; it is at that time that the date of archiving takes place.

I think I have responded sufficiently to the questions I have asked. I am confident that this will enable my service in the future to do what is expected for the safety of all of us.

Today, of course, I gave only a summary. I did not repeat everything. There were also some technical questions about things that are unclear. So I would like to correct that there would only be a discussion about a battalion and the supervision of the archives. You also admit it. It is a concern that we all share. We will continue to follow this.

I want to talk about the deadline. In the committee I gave the example of the dossier of the Bende van Nijvel. We must be clear. You say that the deadline begins to run from the moment the file with the intelligence service is closed. The criminal limitation period has been increased to 40 years. It will run for another 10 years. I suspect that the Security of the State has a file about the Bende of Nijvel, or elements thereof. I assume that she will not close this before the criminal limitation period. There may be elements in it that can be useful. 40 years plus 50 years is 90 years. That is, the archives of the State Security will not be made public until 90 years after the facts. I think this is a bit late.

What did you do? Previously, the term for State Security was 30 years, but by the amendment that was discussed by the majority, everything is brought to 50 years, because this was the norm for the military intelligence service. The consequence is, of course, by the rule on the beginning of the term, that this is a very long term. That does crack a little. I would like to point out that this is a problem for us.

Mr. Van Hecke, I understand your concern about the deadlines. At the same time, however, the impression is created that those archives would not be accessible for research. In the committee, however, I read as an example a few thanks letters from researchers. In the archive of the ADIV we receive more than 600 people per year, who look at classified archives or not. The classified archives can of course only be viewed with the necessary security authorization. I think your concern is therefore somewhat overdimensional, in the sense that people who want to conduct serious research on those archives will have access to it.