Name: Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs Ordinary meeting
Uploaded: 2026-07-14T13:30:00+00:00
Duration: 9020 s

08:38 - 08:57

Speaker 3

What is the plan about this meeting today? I'm just wondering when we're supposed to start like 10 minutes ago? Is there somebody who could step in on his behalf?

08:57 - 09:02

Speaker 2

Yeah, he informed us that he may be some minutes late, so we are waiting.

09:02 - 11:05

Speaker 3

Maybe we can just put forward a motion that you chair this meeting until he's here and we can just vote on it quickly. I think we have a pretty much agreement across group lines that we can do this. Would you put forward that motion? Ervin, maybe you just start. I think we will all just join you in doing this.

11:05 - 11:50

Speaker 4

Well, dear colleagues, let's resume our session. Sorry to keep you waiting these few minutes. The next item on our agenda is the consideration of the draft report on the proposal for a directive on combating firearms trafficking and other firearms-related offenses. It is the first legislative proposal under the new EU strategy for internal security Protect EU. I will now give the floor to the rapporteur for the file, Mrs. Incir, to have her presentation and you will have the floor for five minutes.

And then we will open the floor to the shadow rapporteurs. Mrs. Incir, floor is yours.

11:50 - 15:27

Speaker 1

Thank you very much, Chair. Firearms are the lifeblood of organized crime, they fuel gang violence, drug trafficking, human trafficking and terrorism. Criminal networks use guns to spread fear and tighten their grip on our societies. The reality is alarming. Around 620,000 firearms are reported lost or stolen in the European Union and around 1,300 people are being killed yearly due to firearm violence.

New technologies such as 3D printing are making this threat even greater. And perhaps most horrifying of all, organized crime is now grooming children to kill other children. Europe must therefore respond with determination, we must cut off the supply of illicit firearms, strengthen the police cooperation and ensure that weapons stay out of the hands of criminals. Every illegal firearm removed from our streets is a life that could be saved. To go straight into my ten key points.

Although it is clear from the recital, I reaffirm that nothing in this directive should be interpreted as change in the rules currently applied to the legal manufacture, commerce or possession of firearms. More importantly, about the criminal offenses, I believe I have brought improvement to the proposal by splitting offenses related to firearms and essential components on one side and offenses related to ammunition on the other side for two reasons. Law enforcement agencies see it as more logical and it is more proportional, I would say. I have created a specific illicit trade offense to also cover trafficking done within one member state. Illicit trafficking will cover illicit flows of weapons between the member states and or to and from third countries, but was insufficient to address intra-EU member states' illicit flows of weapons.

I expanded the constitutive sub-elements of the criminal offenses in the recital so that we make it clear that, for instance, manufacturing firearms illegally also covers reactivating deactivated weapons, causing a change in the category of the weapons through an upgrade or mounting a weapon on unmanned systems like drones or robots. And this was the only way that I could see to address the issue of drones. Although I support it fully, I have tweaked some words in the offenses of dissemination of blueprints to align them with other legislations and notably the DSA. Indeed, I want this directive to allow for removal order of online content, so we needed to make sure of that. I will keep serious negligence as I have been convinced by the stakeholders I met, it could help to open investigations that would not have been opened without a legal basis.

I have strengthened the aggravated circumstances to reflect the reality. These now include recruiting children, possessing multiple firearms, trafficking firearms into a criminal environment, stealing or diverting weapons from military or public stocks and carrying firearms into public areas. On penalties, I remain close to the Commission's proposals and it looks very different, I need to say, among the member states right now. Prison sentences and sanctions for legal persons should remain proportionate to the seriousness of offenses that enable other crimes.