 | Now they're going too far! |
DRESDEN, Germany - EU justice chiefs took aim at violent video games on Tuesday, agreeing to share information across the bloc on which games to outlaw and how, but leaving the final decision on bans with states themselves.
The executive European Commission said it would also draw up plans in coming weeks to harmonise national penalties on retailers caught selling such products to under-age children. ‘These terrible things contribute to violence and sooner or later that leads to police intervention,’ Germany’s Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said of violent video games, after EU justice ministers discussed them at a meeting in Dresden.
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Germany, which holds the EUÂ’s rotating presidency, will draw up a comparative list of violent games banning procedures throughout the bloc in a move that Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries said would help to share best practices.
But the EU’s justice and security commissioner said it would not lead to harmonised EU-wide bans. ‘Each member state will decide which video games are violent and so to be banned. It’s not a decision to be taken in Brussels,’ Franco Frattini told a news conference.
| Unless the member states fail to do as they're told. |
Frattini said he would however make a proposal to the blocÂ’s justice ministers in the first half of this year to harmonise sanctions on retailers selling violent video games to children younger than the label allows.
He said current controls in the blocÂ’s 27 states were insufficient and that too often retailers were not checking the age of young people buying games which should not be sold to under 16-year olds. |