France’s Push to Expand Surveillance Is Predictable but Possibly Futile
Despite the breadth of the proposed legislation, which was overwhelmingly passed by the lower house of Parliament on Tuesday, the increased surveillance would probably not have prevented Chérif and Saïd Kouachi from massacring 12 people at the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, the analysts said.
Nor would the added measures probably have headed off Amedy Coulibaly from taking hostages days later at a kosher grocery store, killing four of them, in addition to a police officer, they said.
“The Kouachi brothers and Coulibaly were already targeted by the intelligence services,” Mr. Sur noted, and the authorities already have more information and suspects than they can possibly track with the current levels of resources and funding ..
.. And nowhere do those factors play a stronger role than in France, which has the largest Muslim population in Europe and has seen more of its citizens go to Syria and Iraq than any other European country.
.. Now, human rights and civil liberties advocates say their worry is that if the French legislation is enacted, the country will be in the vanguard of repressive states like Russia that use surveillance powers to monitor not only potential terrorists but also anyone who is seen as a threat to the government.
.. “My fear is that France is setting an example here and it encourages a race for the bottom on a global level,” said Cynthia Wong, a lawyer and senior Internet researcher for Human Rights Watch. “If France does it, why wouldn’t every other government do the same thing?”