Secretary Chertoff Talks to Irish Audience about U.S. Security Measures

Secretary Chertoff Talks to Irish Audience about U.S. Security Measures

During his visit to Ireland, Secretary Michael Chertoff from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security spoke frankly with a capacity audience at the Institute for European Affairs in Dublin.  Secretary Chertoff acknowledged concerns about many in Europe that new requirements on travel to the United States would be an invasion of privacy.  However, he explained, the information which is required is already public information which has already been given to the airlines and travel agents.  He also assured questioners that there were agreed upon time limits to how long the information would be kept and that this was in keeping with requirements that were being instituted in many of the countries in Europe.  Chertoff went on to explain that the collection of 10 fingerprints, as opposed to the two fingerprints which have been collected for the past several years, would enable DHS to match latent fingerprints collected at crime scenes and scenes of terrorist activity.

In response to a question about why the information was being collected, Chertoff explained that it was like someone coming to your house.  When someone knocks at your door you have the right to ask who that person is.  If they don’t give you an adequate answer, you have the right to refuse them entry into your house.  A country has the right to do the same thing.  When someone comes to the border the border guard has a right to determine a person’s identity before letting them in.

US Ambassador, Thomas Foley; Director of the Institute of European Affairs, Alan Dukes; Secretary Chertoff; and Secretary General of Irish Department of Defence, Michael Howard

Secretary Chertoff was asked about the different approaches to security taken in the United States and Europe.  Chertoff replied that he found that many of his counterparts in Europe had very similar outlooks to the United States on many security questions.  He highlighted several instances where the United States had adopted, or was in the process of adopting, security measures which were already existent in other countries.

During his visit to Ireland Secretary Chertoff met with government officials and toured the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol facilities at both the Dublin and Shannon airports.