The usual right-wing fear mongering, based on no facts whatsoever. (And it has had the usual effect of whipping up hysteria among the wingnuts, as can be seen by the comments: treason! impeach Obama! communism! marxism! Blah, blah, blah.
Whoever wrote this article is an idiot or a deliberate liar. Interpol (which already had various exemptions under previous executive orders) isn't part of the US government, and was never subject to the FOIA! And since its office is located within the DOJ, do you really think it withholds information *from* the DOJ?
Interpol has no police powers -- no power to arrest, no power to extradite, nothing.
AFAIK, it exists to share information on suspected criminals between police forces of different nations. From Wikipedia:
Quote:
Each member country maintains a National Central Bureau (NCB) staffed by national law enforcement officers. The NCB is the designated contact point for the Interpol General Secretariat, regional bureau and other member countries requiring assistance with overseas investigations and the location and apprehension of fugitives. This is especially important in countries with many law-enforcement agencies. This central bureau is a unique point of contact for foreign entities, which may not understand the complexity of the law-enforcement system of the country they attempt to contact. For instance, the NCB for the United States of America is housed at the United States Department of Justice (DOJ). The NCB then ensures the proper transmission of information to the correct agency.
Interpol maintains a large database charting unsolved crimes and both convicted and alleged criminals. At any time, a member nation has access to specific sections of the database and its police forces are encouraged to check information held by Interpol whenever a major crime is committed. The rationale behind this is that drug traffickers and similar criminals have international ties, and so it is likely that crimes extend beyond political boundaries.
In 2002, following United Nations Security Council Resolution 1373 passed in the aftermath of September 11, Interpol began maintaining a database of lost and stolen identification and travel documents, allowing member countries to be alerted to the true nature of such documents when presented. Passport fraud, for example, is often performed by altering a stolen passport; in response, several member countries have worked to make online queries into the stolen document database part of their standard operating procedure in border control departments. As of early 2006, the database contained over ten million identification items reported lost or stolen, and is expected to grow more as more countries join the list of those reporting into the database.
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Most importantly, all this order does is make Interpol entirely subject, without the previous exceptions, to the terms of the International Organizations Immunities Act, which has been federal law since 1945!!
