PARIS — Reeling from the Paris terrorism attacks, France announced broad measures to fight homegrown terrorism like giving police better equipment and hiring more intelligence agents, as European officials sought to strike a balance between rushing through tough counterterrorism laws and protecting treasured democratic rights.
Prime Minister Manuel Valls laid out the counterterrorism initiatives just as the Paris prosecutor announced preliminary charges against four men for allegedly providing logistical support to one of the attackers behind three days of violence this month that resulted in 17 deaths before the three gunmen were shot dead by police.
France plans to spend 425 million euros, $490 million, over the next three years for the new measures. They include leaning on Internet companies and social media to help in the fight, creating an improved database of suspected extremists, and increasing intelligence-gathering on jihadis and other radicals — in part by making it easier to tap phones. About 2,600 counterterrorism officers will be hired, 1,100 of them specifically for intelligence services.
Meanwhile, at the European Union headquarters in Brussels, efforts are being made to overcome privacy objections and ease the sharing of air passenger information. But continental leaders warned about going too far, at the risk of undermining individual rights that are a cornerstone of the European way of life.
“The last thing” is for Europeans “to change the nature of our open societies as a reaction to this threat. Because then, we would play into the hands of these terrorists,” said EU Vice President Frans Timmermans.
Some calls have emerged for a European equivalent of the U.S. Patriot Act, which was passed within weeks of the Sept. 11 attacks, to strengthen the hand of authorities to prevent terrorism. Some of its components were controversial — like the unprecedented authority to search, seize, detain or eavesdrop in pursuit of suspected terrorists.
“That is not the way to go,” said Sophie In’t Veld, a leading Liberal civil rights lawmaker at the European Parliament. “We should use more than two weeks to think about this, instead of rushing things through.”
France has repeatedly strengthened its counterterrorism laws over the years, including a measure passed in November that focused on preventing extremists from joining fighters abroad. One measure, set to be activated in the coming weeks, would allow authorities to ask Internet service providers to block sites that glorify terrorism.
Authorities across the continent are concerned about more than 3,000 Europeans who have traveled to fight in Syria and Iraq, and have noted the difficulty in tracking them.
