France to Deport Islamists, Cut Off Immigration, Stop Paying Jizya

Just kidding. Actually, instead of reversing their own asinine policies, the French government may enact yet another asinine measure which will invade everyone's privacy equally.

French lawmakers on Thursday backed government plans to allow greatly increased video-surveillance of public places, a key provision of a new anti-terrorism bill drawn up following the London transport bombings.

After a first reading of the bill, the lower house national assembly approved the articles allowing video cameras to be set up in public locations including on the transport network, in places of worship and in shops.

This is not necessarily a bad thing, assuming they specify mosques, not churches and synagogues. The next logical step is not addressed, namely, deporting individuals identified to be in the country illegally and/or preaching jihad.

Companies would also be allowed to film the outskirts of their premises and police would be able to access the footage under the new law, which will be put to a final vote in parliament on Tuesday.

France currently has just 60,000 video cameras in public places compared to four million in Britain. Interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy, who drew up the legislation following the attacks on London's transport network in July, was reportedly inspired by British investigators' use of video footage to identify the perpetrators.

. . . The country is particularly concerned about the threat posed by young French Muslims who go to fight alongside insurgents in Iraq -- of whom intelligence services know of 22 so far -- and return to France with a radicalised agenda.

France has also been singled out as a target by the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) [I love that one], an Algerian insurgent group with links to the al-Qaeda Islamist terror network.

Click here for an excellent profile of GSPC, and see Thugburg for a list of known GSPC jihadiots. Hizb-ut-Tahrir (Party of Liberation) has not -- yet -- attained the status of a terrorist group, but they may have been involved in the French riots. HT's official website is here, and Strategypage's profile is here.