Finally, MEPs back plan for airlines to share terror information

AIRLINES will be forced to share details of passengers with security services before they fly under a counter-terror plan approved by MEPs yesterday.

Passenger records from across Europe will be used to identify potential terror suspects and to trace travel patterns.

Officials mooted the idea to collect data on everyone flying in and out of Europe in 2007, but the plan championed by Theresa May had been repeatedly blocked by Left-wing politicians.

But yesterday MEPs finally agreed to sign off on the law under pressure following the Paris and Brussels attacks.

French interior minister Bernard Cazeneuve welcomed the deal as a ‘precious tool’ to strengthen European security by making it easier to detect the movements of suspected Islamic militants. Airlines operating

‘We cannot afford to waste time’

flights in or out of EU countries will be obliged to send all passenger details – such as name, itinerary, bank card information, home address and meal preference – to the authorities.

The data will be stored for six months so it could also be used to pick up suspicious travel patterns, for instance journeys to and from terrorism hotspots such as Syria.

All flights coming in and out of the EU will be covered, but member states can decide whether to record information for flyers travelling within the continent.

The data, known as Passenger Name Records, is already used in the US and UK to detect terrorist activity, drug and people trafficking.

Tory MEP and former home officer minister Timothy Kirkhope, who steered the legislation through the European Parliament, said: ‘EU governments must now get on with implementing this agreement.

‘We cannot afford to waste any more time in developing a robust response to the terrorist threat.’

At an emergency summit in Brussels in December in the wake of the Paris attacks, Mrs May told ministers they had ‘been waiting too long’ to enact the plan.