Today the International League for Human Rights filed a complaint along with

The data protection association digitalcourage e.V. (Bielefeld),

The Chaos Computer Club e. V. (Hamburg),

The League’s vice president and attorney Dr. Rolf Gössner,

The spokeswomen of the Chaos Computer Club e. V. (Hamburg), Dr. Constanze Kurz,

And the digitalcourage board members Rena Tangens und padeluun

to the Federal Public Prosecutor

 

download: DOC

 

The unfounded mass surveillance of the population as well as digital espionage conducted by the US’ secret service NSA and other secret services and presumably linked to violations of civil rights and criminal law must be judicially inspected and if so, punished.

This may include unlawful intelligence operations, infringements of the personal and private sphere, data spy outs as well as the obstruction of justice and punishment in office.

The complaint is filed against the US-American, British, and German secret services (The Federal Intelligence Service, the German domestic security agency „Verfassungsschutz“, The Military Counterintelligence Service) and notably against the responsible persons in office which were cooperatively involved in the secret service activities and the boundless, excessive data transmission thus directly and indirectly contributing to the creation of a global surveillance system.

The complaint is filed against the Federal Chancellor and the Minister for Internal Affairs which are responsible for the alleged complicity and aid of the Federal German secret services. It is also filed against the entire Federal Government as well as against all responsible predecessors in office of the last two decades.

 

League Vice President Dr. Rolf Goessner on his motivation to join in filing the complaint:

“This step is the attempt to rupture the prevalent sense of powerlessness in regard of the extent of surveillance and the daily discoveries as well as to find the criminally responsible persons in the Federal Government and the secret services and to bring them to justice – on the grounds of their close cooperation and the intense data exchange with the NSA as well as other secret services and for the sharing of surveillance devices and infrastructure by NSA and the Federal German secret services – as Edward Snowden recently revealed.“

 

The disclosure of secret service practices and structures beyond democratic control has a crucial  impact on the effected citizens, associations of civil society, the state, the society itself and on politics, the economy, on the essence of basic and civil rights as well as on the awareness and behavior of  humans.

 

Rolf Goessner: “The constitutionally granted right to communicate without being surveilled is an indispensable prerequisite for an open, democratic society  – but it is being violated under the current circumstances of mass surveillance. Despite the fact that the protection of its citizens along with preventing the erosion of the  constitutional democracy itself belong to the Federal Government’s core duties, it has unlawfully refrained from protecting citizens and enterprises effected by economic espionage from this hostile attack.“

 

President of the League Prof. Dr. Fanny-Michaela Reisin  calls to collectively resist and to support the filed complaint for the following reasons:

“We urgently need a clarification of the legal situation of the responsible persons in view of offenses against criminal and constitutional law – regardless of political interests (in foreign affairs). For this reason the League has initiated the complaint against the responsible persons for the mass surveillance along with the Leagues in France and Belgium under the coordination of its international umbrella organization FIDH in Paris.

Our initiative should insistently encourage civil society to resist the attacks on civil rights and the law currently in place with all might – before it may be to late. We call for all associations as well citizens to join in the complaint and to support it publicly!“

 

For more information we call your attention to the attached press release of the two attorneys Eberhard Schultz and Claus Forrster in Berlin that have drafted the complaint for the League and in the name of the other complainants.

Contact for today’s Monday

 

Office of the League

Fon:                                                    +49 (0) 30 – 396 21 22

Fax:                                                    +49 (0) 30 – 396 21 47

E-Mail:                                               vorstand@ilmr.de

 

E-Mail of Rolf Gössner:                  rolf-goessner@ilmr.de

 

Attorneys Schultz & Förster

Fon:                                                   +49 (0) 30 43725026 ·

Fax:                                                    +49 (0) 30 43725027