EU & US anti-terrorism talks resume
The European Commission and the US Treasury have begun a series of talks on the contested financial data sharing deal to combat terrorism in an effort to clinch an agreement before the end of June 2010, Commission sources said
SWIFT is a Belgium-based private company that handles the banking transactions of thousands of banks, including most European ones.
Following the September 11 terrorist attacks in 2001, the US government used the new Terrorist Finance Tracking Programme (TFTP) to force SWIFT's American branch (which mirrors all data based in Belgium) to allow US officials access to all bank transactions in order to help anti-terrorism operations.
In a show of newly-gained power under the Lisbon Treaty, in February 2010, the European Parliament blocked an interim SWIFT data-sharing agreement negotiated by the European Commission and the US Treasury.
Some European political groups, notably the liberal faction in the Parliament, have repeatedly criticised the agreement as "not only a restraint on European sovereignty but a massive intrusion into every single European citizen's privacy".
Efforts to restore the deal have taken on a heady pace as talks began just hours after EU ministers gave the Commission negotiators their blessing to go ahead and re-launch negotiations that were derailed by parliamentary opposition in February.
