After months of inquiring into whistle-blower Edward Snowden's allegations of massive spying and surveillance on the EU and its citizens by the United States National Security Agency, the European Parliament's Civil Liberties Committee today adopted a report outlining the results of its investigation.

 

Reacting to the vote, GUE/NGL President Gabi Zimmer said: “We welcome the adoption of this report because for the first time the Parliament is in effect admitting that this spying and surveillance actually took place, instead of just being suspected.

 

“However on the down side,” she continued, “there was no real discussion about the abuse of anti-terrorism laws based on false assumptions, nothing about offering asylum to Snowden, no demand to put an end to the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and no real revision of the overall security architecture today, with the blurring of lines between internal and external security, police and intelligence.”

 

The Committee's inquiry has been on-going since September last and has included over 15 hearings with representatives from the EU institutions, national parliaments, the US Congress, IT companies, NGOs and journalists.

 

The vote result was 33 in favour, 7 against and 17 abstentions.

 

The report is expected to be voted in plenary during the March session (10-13 March).