parliament member

Last month the European Union officially signed the controversial “anti-piracy” trade agreement ACTA.

We recently wrote about a ridiculous copyright law being proposed in Italy, that could ban people from using the internet based on a single accusation of infringement.

As we noted, the law did not appear to agree with overall EU law. Some in the EU Parliament are taking notice.

EU Commissioner Karel de Gucht has been the EU's main supporter behind ACTA. de Gucht was caught lying about ACTA last year to get it approved (telling EU members that ACTA fit under existing laws, and only later admitting some members might have to change their laws).

Even with ACTA supposedly in a "final" state, it appears that the negotiators just can't resist keeping up their level of stifling secrecy. Glyn Moody points us to the news that the EU's main backer of ACTA, Commissioner Karel De Gucht, has refused to turn over some "preparatory documents" concerning ACTA that were requested by European Parliament Member Francoise Castex.

This week's "favorites" post comes courtesy of regular commenter Jay.

Welcome to one and all to Jay's favorites of the week!

Unfortunately, there were a lot of great stories to look at this week, with triumphs and pitfalls all throughout. With so many choices, I had to form a few committees to keep them all organized!

So without further ado, we present to you the committee as well as the stories that fit their themes!

Dissonance Committee

A little over a year ago, the EU agreed to a deal with the US, called the SWIFT agreement, which said that the US could get access to EU citizens' financial transaction data.

This was so that the US could (in theory) better track down terrorists. That's the story we're told, anyway.

Via Glyn Moody we get this absolutely bizarre quote from an anonymous Australian Parliament Member who wants to have the Australian government help try to shut down Julian Assange and Wikileaks.