WRITTEN QUESTION E-1969/98

by Iñigo Méndez de Vigo (PPE) to the Commission

(30 June 1998)

Subject: Free movement of persons in the Schengen area

The Schengen Convention takes up one of the great challenges of the construction of Europe, namely the free movement of persons within Europe. One of its goals is to abolish both border and police controls at the internal borders between the signatory states, without prejudice to the maintenance of public order and national security. To counterbalance this, controls at external borders will be strengthened.

What is the Commission's view of the practice followed by the airline Sabena of asking passengers for their national identity documents and checking their validity when giving them their boarding cards?

Answer given by Mr Monti on behalf of the Commission

(5 October 1998)

The elimination of controls on people crossing internal borders - including passengers on intra-Community flights - is a fundamental objective of the Community (Article 7A of the EC Treaty) which, unfortunately, is not yet achieved. That explains why still today, in accordance with Community law in force, those crossing an internal border of the Community can be subject to frontier controls. This objective has so far only been partially met, on the basis of international conventions between a limited number of Member States such as the Schengen Agreement.

In order to achieve this objective throughout the Community as a whole, the Commission submitted in July 1995 proposals for three directives (Council directive on the elimination of controls on persons crossing internal frontiers(1); Council directive on the right of third-country nationals to travel in the Community(2); Parliament and Council directive amending Directive 68/360/EEC on the abolition of restrictions on movement and residence within the Community for workers of Member States and their families and Directive 73/148/EEC on the abolition of restrictions on movement and residence within the Community for nationals of Member States with regard to establishment and the provision of services(3)). The first proposal specifies, on the one hand, that the elimination of controls on people will also apply to passengers on intra-Community flights and, on the other hand, that the suppression of controls aims not only at controls carried out by the official authorities but also controls carried out under the terms of national legislation of a Member State by others, for example by carriers.

It should be stressed that this principle of the elimination of the internal frontier controls concerns only "frontier" controls, i.e. the controls which are applied in connection or on the occasion of the crossing of an internal border. On this subject, it must be remembered that controls which can be carried out by the carriers can pursue three objectives. Firstly, controls may be carried out by carriers before embarkation in order to avoid the sanctions envisaged in the legislation of the Member State of destination with regard to carriers which convey foreigners who are not in possession of the travel documents required for the entry on their territory (an identity card or a passport provided, if necessary, with a visa). It is obvious that such controls are not carried out with regard to domestic flight passengers and these controls should therefore be qualified as "frontier" controls. Secondly controls at the time of embarkation may seek to ensure the safety of people and of assets during transport. Finally, there may be controls which relate to the contract of carriage and in particular those which aim to check on the use of personal tickets. These last two categories of controls are or can also be carried out by carriers in domestic flights. Thus these controls do not constitute "frontier" controls and should therefore not be abolished in an area without internal borders. However, for the time being, the "frontier" controls carried out by carriers are not questionable from the point of view of current Community law.

Until the date of the entry into force of the Amsterdam Treaty, the Schengen Convention does not form part of Community law or of the law of the Union and, consequently, it is not appropriate for the Commission to give at this stage an opinion on its interpretation and application, except whenever provisions of Schengen or their application interfere with Community law.

(1) OJ C 289, 31.10.1995.

(2) OJ C 306, 17.11.1995.

(3) OJ C 307, 18.11.1995.