Mmmm . . . Sovereignty

The ECJ's convenient grants of power to the EU Commission (like Allah's to Muhammad?) continue the inevitable march to tyranny: Brussels publishes list of first seven pan-European crimes; "incitement to racial hatred" may be next.

Brussels unveiled detailed proposals yesterday that would for the first time create a body of pan-European criminal law and force member states to punish citizens who transgress it.

The European Commission listed seven offences that it insisted should become European crimes immediately, including computer hacking, corporate fraud, people-trafficking and marine pollution.

The ruling means that for the first time in legal history, a British government and Parliament will no longer have the sovereign right to decide what constitutes a crime and what the punishment should be.

The highly controversial announcement, made possible by a European Court of Justice ruling in September, would represent a huge transfer of power from national capitals to the EU.

The case before the court in September applied only to environmental law, but the Commission says it means that it can create criminal penalties to enforce the entire body of EU law.

The possible future EU crimes are intellectual property theft; racial discrimination and incitement to racial hatred; trafficking in human organs and tissue; and corruption in awarding public contracts.

A member state that opposed the crime will still have to introduce it if a sufficient number of other EU states voted for it. If a government were to refuse to implement the EU legislation, it could be hauled before the European Court of Justice, which can compel it to do so.

Of course, "racial discrimination and incitement to racial hatred" in Europe does not mean redlining or cross-burning as it might in the US. It means offending Muslims, by such things as criticizing Muhammad, pig statues in the town square, or Pooh and Piglet on your desk at work. Fun fact: in Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan, the penalty for criticizing Muhammad is death.