On Thursday, the Progress Party put forward a proposal in the Storting to establish time-limited and geographically limited visitation zones in particularly crime-prone areas.
– With this proposal, the police will be given the right to visit people completely without them having to have a specific suspicion, said FRP’s justice policy spokesman Per-Willy Amundsen to The online newspaper.
The proposal makes law professor Hans Fredrik Marthinussen shake his head. He points out that Britain was convicted in the European Court of Human Rights for violating the right to privacy when the country allowed the police to physically search any person within a geographical area to prevent terrorist acts.
– This proposal to Frp goes even further than that. There is no suspicion of terror, and it is really free game. It is clearly in violation of human rights. No Norwegian courts will accept it, and the proposal is clearly stillborn, Marthinussen says to NTB.
Amundsen disagrees with the criticism
Per-Willy Amundsen disagrees with Marthinussen and takes the criticism with crushing calm.
– I think it is excellent to reconcile with human rights. Proportionality should be the basis, and it is a question of limited physical areas and time periods, he says.
The FRP politician says access will be relevant in periods when gangs in Oslo districts are a growing problem, so that it can be quickly shut down.
Pointing to Denmark and the United Kingdom
Amundsen believes that Denmark and the United Kingdom have succeeded well with a similar scheme.
– In that case, both Denmark and the United Kingdom violate these human rights he intends to refer to, says Amundsen.
The Danish Police Act allows for «Visitation zones» where the police can search people, property and cars without concrete suspicion that a criminal act has been committed. A British law opens for the same for up to 48 hours.
Others other than Amundsen and Frp also believe that the police should have greater access to perform body searches. In December, SP politician Jan Bøhler argued that the police should be able to control everyone who gets off at various subway stations for knives and machetes.
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