The other actions on government surveillance and racial profiling strike a balance between civil liberty and security.
But swabbing hands does not, by itself, raise civil liberty problems, Stanley said.
Given that it also counts Angola, Malaysia, Thailand and Uganda hardly paragons of civil liberty among its current members, disappointments may be more likely.
Mr Blair is no liberal, splutters Mr Kennedy: just look at New Labour's authoritarian record on asylum-seekers, jury trials, civil liberty and all the rest.
This is a civil liberty which should be available to all.
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In the UK civil liberty groups fear that the EU law will be used to help usher in another controversial law that also mandates data retention.
The right to gun ownership is enshrined in the constitution and is regarded by many as an issue of civil liberty something that Europeans struggle to understand.
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Thus far it has been a gentlemanly, Lords-like debate - largely among lawyers and retired spooks - about the nuanced battle between national security and civil liberty.
The decision to keep the DNA records of people who had not been convicted of any crime was a controversial step which attracted criticism from civil liberty campaigners.
BBC: Rules covering the handling of DNA samples changed in 2001
The change meant police could keep DNA samples from suspects even if they went on to be acquitted at court - a move criticised by civil liberty groups.
BBC: Rules covering the handling of DNA samples changed in 2001
Civil liberty campaign groups expressed frustration with Mr Anderson's report.
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On the other side of the aisle, for all of our political disagreements, I think Rand Paul has been a breath of fresh air on many civil liberty issues.
But it has still drawn fierce criticism from the tech-savvy (who claim the proposal is unworkable) and civil liberty-conscious (who, as ever, fear any regulation of the internet at all).
The ACLU Director Anthony Romero called it one of the worst civil liberty measures ever enacted in American history, and that kind of echoes what House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said.
But in the midst of a tetchy discussion, one voice did defend the Western understanding of democracy and civil liberty, and indeed the compatibility of those principles with the devout practice of Islam.
What may instead be true is that, to the dismay of liberals, the growing belief that Mr Obama is a Muslim will compel him to be ever more risk-averse when choosing between safety and civil liberty.
Now, three civil liberty groups, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Electronic Privacy Information Center and Privacy International, have sent another letter to the Council of Europe outlining their "continuing concerns" over the wording of the treaty and saying that their fears have not been laid to rest.
"We fully support the police using technology to combat crime and terrorism, but law-abiding New Yorkers should not end up in a police database every time they walk their dog, go to the doctor, or drive around Manhattan, " Christopher Dunn, associate legal director at the New York Civil Liberty Union, said.
The committee, consisting of an unpaid group of people from the world of corporate privacy as well as the civil liberty community, were asked last December to review the plan and provide feedback on which privacy protections need to be put in place when info from DHS components (which include the TSA, the Secret Service, and Immigration Services, to name a few) are consolidated.
Civil-liberty advocates have long expressed concerns about law-enforcement expanding its reach through technology, particularly in retaining information on citizens who haven't committed a crime.
We need people like Ron Wyden on the left and Ron Paul on the right, even though they may not agree on everything, who are willing to go up against civil-liberty-quashing laws and attempts at censorship.
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John Wadham, director of civil rights group Liberty, said it was a "manifestly unjust and discriminatory" power.
John Wadham, director of civil rights organisation Liberty, described the law as "a fundamental part of our criminal justice system".
The head of the civil rights group Liberty, John Wadham, admitted it would be counter-productive to allow all those targeted by the police to find out if their phones were tapped.
The proposals have been strongly criticised by civil rights groups Amnesty, Liberty and Reprieve, who are opposed to the use of withheld evidence in civil cases and the power the changes will give ministers.
Civil liberties campaign group Liberty welcomed the fall in such searches but urged ministers to introduce restrictions.
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