The Treaty of Prüm: A Replay of Schengen?

[From the introduction]. On 27 May 2005, seven EU member states signed the “Treaty of Prüm” on the stepping up of cross-border cooperation, particularly in combating terrorism, cross-border crime and illegal migration.2 It was based on an initiative by the then German Interior Minister Otto Schily from mid-2003. The paper starts with a few remarks on the notion of “differentiated integration” for which Schengen and Prüm are prime examples. The Schengen process will be summoned up. The core of this paper deals on the one hand with the way to the Prüm Treaty and its final contents. On the other hand, the signing and ratification, also by EU member states other than the original signatories, and its entry into force will be discussed. The debate on the integration of major parts of the Prüm Treaty into the EU legal framework, which started soon after its signing, will be described. The final sections of the paper present some controversial views of the Treaty among scholars and the analysis by European Data Protection Supervisor of the draft Decision intending to integrate parts of the Prüm Treaty into the Third Pillar of the EU. A few concluding remarks on the whole process wrap up the paper