August 10, 2008: Britain is
refusing to share intelligence with Bulgaria and Hungary, fearing that
corruption in those nations intelligence agencies might result in British data
getting back to the wrong people. This all became an issue after the EU established
the Joint Situation Center, to coordinate intelligence from European Union
members, to better deal with terrorism, gunrunning and all manner of avoidable
(because of sufficient intelligence) disasters. The British checked out this
arrangement, and found it wanting.
The British were always leery of arrangements like this , having been
burned in the past. Moreover, they know that the smaller EU countries like to
use this sharing arrangement to pick up free intel that they can use. The
British don't mind a certain amount of this, but they do mind outright sale of
their info to gangsters or terrorists. No one likes to come right out and say this, but the problem
is there, and apparently bad enough to let the current situation go public.
Bulgaria and Romania, who only recently joined the EU, had to clean up
the corruption problems in their governments before they could get in. Both are
now being criticized by the EU for quickly dropping their anti-corruption
efforts once they were part of the EU, and basically going back to their bad
old ways.
