WRITTEN QUESTION P-1088/01

by Jens-Peter Bonde (EDD) to the Commission

(27 March 2001)

Subject: Schengen agreement medical passport, identification card and permanent border control

For which medicines is special certification required under Schengen rules when private individuals cross national frontiers, and is the Danish Government's list consistent with Schengen rules?

Under Schengen rules, must all citizens be able to identify themselves to the police by means of an ID card to be carried at all times, or is it permissible not to carry an ID card? Which ID cards will be recognised in Denmark when the country joins the Schengen area on 25 March 2001?

Do the rules allow the permanent deployment of patrol cars at internal borders in the Schengen area to:

- check passports and/or identification papers,

- carry out veterinary checks, and

- verify compliance with environmental legislation?

Answer given by Mr Vitorino on behalf of the Commission

(8 May 2001)

The Schengen rules do not lay down any list of medicines for which a traveller in the Schengen area requires special certification. However, Article 75 of the Convention implementing the Schengen Agreement provides that persons may carry the narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances that are necessary for their medical treatment provided that they can produce a certificate issued by a competent authority.

This rule covers drugs and substances prescribed by a doctor which the persons wishing to visit another Member State need during their stay.

The Article refers to medicines that are mentioned in international Conventions on drugs (Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs of 1961, 1971 Convention on Psychotropic Substances) or which contain substances mentioned in those Conventions and are hence governed by national laws on drugs. However, in accordance with these Conventions, the checks provided for in national legislation on drugs may also cover other substances. Consequently, the list of products that constitute or contain narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances may vary from one State to another.

The certificate provided for in the Schengen acquis does not apply to the transport of routine medicines or antibiotics dispensed on medical prescription.

The scope, conditions and detailed arrangements for conducting identification checks, including means of proof, are all governed by national law. It is therefore up to Denmark to lay down the relevant provisions. In any event, under existing Community law, Member States must, when carrying out identification checks, recognise valid passports and identity cards issued by the other Member States.

Denmark therefore recognises identity cards issued by the other Member States.

Under the Schengen rules, the internal borders of the Schengen area may be crossed at any point without checks on persons being carried out. Accordingly, the competent authorities may no longer carry out checks on persons at internal borders, except where public policy or national security requires such checks to be reintroduced.

The Schengen Executive Committee has decided that alternative border checks are incompatible with the Schengen rules on the abolition of controls on individuals. Alternative border checks are taken to mean systematic checks on persons, carried out on the grounds that they have crossed a border, in a hinterland area adjacent to the border or in defined border areas.

It is therefore forbidden for police patrol cars to park at internal borders in order to carry out checks on passports or identity cards simply because their holders have crossed the border.

As regards veterinary inspections and checks on compliance with environmental legislation, these are matters which are not regulated by the Schengen acquis. However, existing Community law does not allow the permanent deployment of patrol cars at internal borders for the purposes of carrying out veterinary inspections and checks on compliance with environmental legislation.