Public Service discusses the European Parliament's recent rejection of a financial data-sharing agreement with senior MEP Timothy Kirkhope. Kirkhope heads the British Conservatives and also serves on parliament's Civil Liberties Committee. He says the rejection of the Terrorist Finance Tracking Programme (TFTP), which would have enabled the continued transfer of European citizens' banking data to U.S. officials for counter-terrorism purposes, was less about data protection concerns and more about "the manner in which the Council of Ministers sought to circumvent" the European Parliament, and an "unfortunate air of anti-Americanism." Kirkhope says, "I believe that we have to be realistic in order to counter threats of terror..."
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