Controls at borders: fight against counterfeit travel documents. Initiative Germany

The committee adopted a report by Mr William Francis NEWTON DUNN (EPP/ED, UK) amending the text proposed by the Federal Republic of Germany with a view to the adoption of a Council decision. The first amendment seeks to turn the proposal into a regulation rather than a decision, in order to obtain a legal basis and legal form appropriate to the priority objectives of the measure. The committee felt that the primary aim of the measure - combating document forgery - was to prevent illegal immigration. This meant that it came under Title IV of the Amsterdam Treaty ('Visas, asylum, immigration and other policies related to free movement of persons') and its objectives could therefore be achieved by means of a legal basis in that title, namely, Article 63. The committee accordingly adopted a number of amendments aimed at clarifying the legal basis. It also adopted various amendments seeking to integrate the proposed information exchange concerning false travel documents into the European computerised image archiving system (FADO) (instituted by the Council in December 1998) once it is fully operational, to avoid having two parallel systems.