LUXEMBOURG: Six European Union nations, including Malta, yesterday blocked attempts to guarantee suspects the right to an interpreter and legal assistance in their native tongue when facing prosecution in another EU nation.

German Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries, host of a meeting of EU justice ministers, had proposed guaranteeing suspects language rights.

“It is difficult enough to be confronted with justice in one’s own state and even more so in a different country,” she said. “It is important to make oneself understood in such a situation.”

But Britain, the Czech Republic, Ireland, Slovakia, Cyprus and Malta refused to back the proposal. They are keen to keep sensitive criminal legislation under national control, and argued that the European Convention on Human Rights already offers ample guarantees for suspects.

Malta’s Home Affairs Minister Tonio Borg said he and the other opposing nations feared the plan would “open a Pandora’s box” of legal problems for national governments, with the EU pushing human rights norms into areas of domestic law.

British Ambassador John Grant said the EU does not have the power to set such standards for domestic criminal cases.

On the other side, EU Justice and Home Affairs Commissioner Franco Frattini said the EU must “balance out” recent anti-crime measures that boost police powers by guaranteeing citizens more rights and freedoms.

“I don’t quite understand why people are rejecting this,” said French Justice Minister Rachida Dati. “These are the minimum procedural rights people should be given.”

Zypries said the issue would be put aside until the 27-nation bloc agrees on what to do with the stalled EU Constitution treaty, which gives the bloc more power in justice matters.

Separately, EU ministers discussed sharing criminal records.

They worked out the technical details of a network aimed at cracking down on organised crime, sexual offenders and terrorists across the EU. A pilot project among Germany, Belgium, Spain and France has been under way for two years, and other EU nations will join the network.

Nations called for sharing criminal records after a 2004 child murder revealed embarrassing gaps in police investigations of a suspected serial killer arrested in Belgium.

Local authorities there had not been aware of the suspect’s previous convictions in France because they had no access to his criminal records.