From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <hallam@ai.mit.edu>
Date: Fri, 10 Oct 1997 02:56:56 +0800
To: "'cypherpunks@toad.com>
Subject: RE: EU Rejects GAK
Message-ID: <01BCD4C0.6DD164E0.hallam@ai.mit.edu>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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Before people get carried away it is important to realise that the
EU institutions do not map onto US ones. The EU Commission
does not have an analogue in the US system. It is an unelected
group of beureacrats whose purpose is (roughly speaking) to 
harmonize EU law. It does not have legislative powers in its own
right, nor does it necessarily have much influence.

The EU lawmaking process is essentially that the Commision 
drafts some suggestions and passes them onto the council of
ministers which accepts, rejects or ammends them. If there is
unanimous agreement in the concil of ministers (majority vote
on a restricted number of issues) then a directive is issued which
the national parliaments must then enact into law. 

The limited scope of EU laws is critical, the EU is much like the 
US prior to the civil war, the member states are sovereign. 

Thus there is nothing the EU Commission can do to prevent 
member states outlawing crypto, nor for that matter can they 
force them to allow it. They can assist in forming EU wide
regulations either way however.


The real importance of the EU report is probably that it denies
the statements made by the Freeh et. al. claiming that US alies
in Europe are in favour of GAK. Despite the fact that there has 
never been any public demonstration of a commitment the
administration has disingenuously claimed that it has the 
support of and indeed is being pressured to take its stance on
export controls by other countries.

Needless to say it is unconvincing to be told 'trust me' by someone
who is clearly peddling a lie. Few people can prove it is a lie 
because few people can claim to have the personal access to
European politicians the administration can. I know UK politics
well enough to know that the current parliament is not going to 
back any increase of powers for a security service that many 
members of the government was used politically by the Conservatives. 
It would be like the nation of Islam calling for arbitrary arrest powers
for the police.


		Phill