The End of the Transitional Period for Police and Criminal Justice Measures Adopted before the Lisbon Treaty: Who monitors trust in the European Criminal Justice area? CEPS Liberty and Security in Europe No. 74, December 2014

This study examines the legal and political implications of the forthcoming end of the transitional period for the measures in the fields of police and judicial cooperation in criminal matters, as set out in Protocol 36 to the EU Treaties. This Protocol limits some of the most far-reaching innovations introduced by the Treaty of Lisbon over EU cooperation on Justice and Home Affairs for a period of five years after the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon (until 1 December 2014), and provides the UK with special ‘opt out/opt-in’ possibilities. The study focuses on the meaning of the transitional period for the wider European Criminal Justice area. The most far-reaching change emerging from the end of this transition will be the expansion of the European Commission and Luxembourg Court of Justice scrutiny powers over Member States’ implementation of EU criminal justice law. The possibility offered by Protocol 36 for the UK to opt out and opt back in to pre-Lisbon Treaty instruments poses serious challenges to a common EU area of justice by further institutionalising ‘over-flexible’ participation in criminal justice instruments. The study argues that in light of Article 82 TFEU the rights of the defence are now inextricably linked to the coherency and effective operation of the principle of mutual recognition of criminal decisions, and calls the European Parliament to request the UK to opt in EU Directives on suspects procedural rights as condition for the UK to ‘opt back in’ measures like the European Arrest Warrant.

Riding or Reaping the Whirlwind? An Account of the EU’s Engagement with Insecurity in Northern Nigeria. EU Diplomacy Paper No. 9, November 2014

The relations of the European Union (EU) with Africa are increasingly spreading beyond the domain of humanitarian and development cooperation. The continent’s growing potential is producing vast webs of interlinkages in the realms of energy and commerce, among others. At the same time, such interdependencies bring with them increased vulnerabilities to insecurity on the continent. Nigeria exemplifies such a dilemma. The country has just taken the top spot as Africa’s largest economy. Of late, however, violent Islamic extremism ravages the north of the country, threatening the stability of one of Europe’s foremost energy suppliers and a growing trade partner. Thus, this paper sets out to uncover the EU’s response to such a crisis, as well as examining the factors lying behind this response. While the study argues that the issue is potentially ‘Europeaniz-able’ from a member state perspective, deep engagement is seen to be held back by the absence of an effective entry point for securitization with this important ally, as well as the intractability of the EU’s purported multi-functional approach to the idiosyncrasies of the conflict in question, in which not only transnational terrorist groups, but also the central government are centrally implicated in deepening insecurity.

The European Semester in Belgium: A state of play. European Policy Brief No. 32, October 2014

After four rounds of the European Semester process of EU economic coordination, Belgium has done relatively little to comply with EU recommendations. This brief substantiates and confirms this claim after clarifying the meaning of these recommendations. While the challenges underlined by the European Commission still lie ahead, Belgium’s ownership of the recommendations for reforms has been low. Not only do coordination processes remain bureaucratic and technocratic, but many of the recommendations’ concerns – external competitiveness, social security reforms, market reforms – are not traditionally defended by the political left in Belgium. The controversy surrounding the recommendations for national structural reforms owes much to their supply-side orientation, which contrasts with the inability of the EU to pursue demand-side policies. But despite this disequilibrium, the recommendations highlight relevant issues that ought to be addressed, and indicate where scope for national debate exists.