EU FAIL: UK Commissioner's SHOCK admission – 'unable to guarantee end of terror attacks'
THE European Union "cannot guarantee" there will not be other terrorist attacks, admitted British European Commissioner Julian King as he dismissed Marine Le Pen's criticism of the Schengen area border policies.
Julian King: We can't guarantee no terrorist attacks
The UK Commissioner argued he did not recognise the far-right French politician's description of the Schengen project as a "sieve that lets people through" to plan and commit terrorist attacks in Europe. Mr King claimed the EU had made significant progress on securing the external borders of the Schengen are and increased cooperation between European Union police forces. But the British Commissioner was forced to admit the Brussels bloc migration policies could not guarantee further terrorist attacks would not happen.
He said: “We have and we price our freedom of movement within the Schengen area.
“We reinforced the controls at the external borders.
“We reinforced the checks that take place for everybody who comes across those borders and we reinforced cooperation between our police forces within the Schengen area.
“There is a possibility for countries to have controls if there is a justified case.
I think we need to be straight forward and say no, we cannot guarantee there won’t be terrorist attacks
“And in fact a good number of countries have got controls.
“So I don’t recognise Marine le Pen’s description of the Schengen area.”
But he added: “If the challenge is can you guarantee there will be no terrorist attacks, then I think we need to be straight forward and say no, we cannot guarantee there won’t be terrorist attacks.
“What we can do is make it harder for terrorists to carry out their attacks by limiting their access to arms, explosives, to money, by attacking radicalisation and the means they use to recruit.”
Strasbourg shooting: Suspect 'shot dead' by police
It comes as last Tuesday Strasbourg's central Christmas market faced a terrorist attack leaving three people dead and more than 30 injured.
Cherif Chekatt, the man thought to be responsible for Tuesday's Christmas market attack, has been shot dead at around 9pm local time on Thursday after being on the run for two days.
Since Chekatt was shot dead, the Islamic State (IS) have claimed responsibility for the terror attack.
The group say Chekatt was a “soldier of the group” - but did not provide any evidence.
Earlier reports said a man had been 'neutralised' in the Strasbourg district, close to where the Christmas market attack took place.