On Wednesday 13 January, experts and over 60 participants debated the balance between security and rights against the background of the recent terrorist threat in Europe and the counter-measures currently under discussion. With the recent legislative discussions on Data Protection Reform and the Passenger Name Record, the security-rights dilemma is now more heated than ever. With this in mind, the European Movement International and the European Citizen Action Service joined forces to facilitate this important debate.

Experts discussed the balance between citizens’ rights -in particular privacy- and security measures. The impact of these measures on Schengen was also a key focus of the debate. The event was introduced with the screening of a short video ‘Voices of the Street’, with short interviews with citizens on the security-rights dilemma. Following the video, Timothy Kirkhope MEP, CER Research Fellow Camino Mortera, EDRi Executive Director Joe McNamee and DG Migration and Home Affairs Policy Officer Jarosław Lotarski crossed swords on the topic and replied to questions from the audience and questions asked via #SecurityOrRights on Twitter, which became a trending topic in Belgium during our debate!

The debate, moderated by Niklaus Nuspliger, was followed by some informal discussions over a drink. A video compilation with the key statements and outcome of the discussion is available here!