THE REAL PURPOSE BEHIND FRA ACT

The Swedish daily Expressen has an interview with Magnus Norell, a terrorism researcher at the Swedish Defense Research Institute. He is suprisingly candid about the FRA Act. In the bargain he does, inadvertently, reveal the true purpose behind the law:

Starting January 1 2009 the defense intelligence service FRA will, based on the FRA Act, eavesdrop on all cable-based communications that cross Sweden's borders.

They also have the right to tap in to cell phone conversations.

Supporters of the law point out that it is necessary in order to protect Swedes from foreign threats. But the problems is that there is no such threat that motivates the law, according to Magnus Norell.

This blog has been pointing to the lack of threats from the get-go.

FRA was a prominent institution during the Cold War, Norell says. But things look completely different today. There is no reason whatsoever to have this surveillance program in place today. ... According to Norell the system also assumes that terrorists will communicate in advance, openly, what they are going to do.

He also explains that if the terrorists are using a coded language (such as "shoes" instead of "explosives") the surveillance program must be able to catch those - which, essentially, is the same as trying to catch terrorists talking openly about their plans.

The newspaper also notes that the European Court recently found that a more restrictive surveillance program in Britain was in violation of the European Charter on Human Rights. Apparently the Swedish government did not bother to wait for the European Court to rule on this issue. They should have done so:

According to Norell the FRA Act gives broader discretionary powers than the British [surveillance program]. Many Western nations have the know-how. But they have constitutional courts that give people the opportunity to try the law against the constitution. They also do not give blanket permission to siphon all communications through the wiretapping program.

Sweden has no constitutional court. The highest authority on the constitution is the legislature that makes the laws that may violate the constitution. In fact, that same legislature is currently preparing to re-write Sweden's 34-year-old current constitution.

In other words, what we now know is that the FRA Act:

a) Was prepared for last year with the purchase of a big eavesdropping-ready computer;
b) Started already in 2005 under the socialist government; and
c) Was likely to face problems in the European Court based on the pending case with the less permissive British surveillance program.

So what is the true purpose behind the FRA Act? After all, it is highly unlikely that any politician would be so stupid as to start up this program years in advance and invest enormous amounts of tax money in it only to have it shut down by the European Court.

Magnus Norell confirms what this blog has already pointed out, namely that there is no real threat against Sweden that motivates the FRA Act as it has been officially marketed. Therefore, there is obviously a covert intent - and that intent is hiding in plain view. It is what the law permits the government to do: to eavesdrop on the entire population without any court order or even the slightest suspicion of foul play.

The true reason behind the FRA Act is, in other words, to legalize surveillance of political dissidents. It is more than likely that the Reinfeldt administration is incompetent enough to not see why its predecessor, the socialist government, wanted this law in the first place. The socialists, on the other hand, have wanted this law since 1995 when then prime minister Goran Persson said he wanted to document and persecute those who critized Sweden abroad.

The socialist party also has a tradition of monitoring the political views of the Swedish people. This has been done either through military intelligence (the "IB" case from the early 1970s is a good example) or through their affiliated unions (the Socialist Workplace Representatives Organization was operative for decades and ostensibly still exists). With the FRA surveillance program the next socialist government can spy on, and record the political views of, virtually the entire population. They can then weed out, target and go after all those they either do not like or consider a threat to their own power.

That is how plainly and simply the FRA Act fits in to modern Swedish politics. It is a tragedy that so many elected officials within the center-right coalition have decided to carry the water for their political adversaries.