REVIEW TOPICS:
Incident at Serbian President’s office raises questions about security of top officials
Head of Serbia’s Financial Investigation Unit to be announced in coming days
US Vice President’s visit to Balkans accompanied by tight security measures
Bulgarian right-winge parties turn against European elections hopefuls with Communist secret police past
FSB experts neutralized powerful explosive device at gas pipeline in Russia’s Dagestan
No real threat to Ukraine’s territorial integrity, SBU Chairman concludes
Risk of buying votes in forthcoming elections high in Latvia – Security Police
Expert on East German state security service speaks out on revealing of explosive Stasi papers
Book written by former secret service vice-chief banned in Kazakhstan
Incident at Serbian President’s office raises questions about security of top officials
After a five-hour standoff after entering the Serbian presidency building armed with two hand grenades, Dragan Maric was disarmed and arrested earlier this week, Balkan Insight reminds.
The day before yesterday, Serbia’s Interior Minister Ivica Dacic stated that this incident had highlighted the need for a revamping of security procedures, online paper marks.
According to the daily Politika, Dacic said that the scenario of someone entering the
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| Serbian President's Office |
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presidency carrying two hand grenades threatening to detonate them was not such a rare situation. Despite the drama of the situation, he reassured the public that President Boris Tadic’s life had not been in danger.
“It’s good that everything ended peacefully. I wouldn’t say that there were any lapses by the security services, while the police and army reacted adequately,” the newspaper cites Dacic.
The minister revealed to the press that politicians in Serbia received dozens of threatening messages daily, which all get checked out.
A member of parliament’s security committee, Deputy Prime Minister Bozidar Delic, said that Maric’s case was a warning and a wake-up call for better security measures for the top officials.
Parliament member Dragan Sormaz said if a person carrying two hand grenades was able to enter the President's building unhindered, that was an oversight on the part of intelligence and military intelligence agencies, responsible for the President’s security, according to Balkan Insight.
Head of Serbia’s Financial Investigation Unit to be announced in coming days
The name of the Serbian Financial Investigations Unit leader will soon be announced to the public, daily Vecernje Novosti reports. The official in question "hails from the police", but has not had public exposure, the newspaper writes.
According to the same report, the state prosecutor’s office and the Serbian police (MUP) have reached an agreement on the candidate whis is to be appointed to head this unit, designed to spearhead efforts to apply the law on forfeiture of assets gained through criminal activity, according to the daily. "The search for Serbia's Elliott Ness lasted since the end of March, when the unit itself was put together."
State Prosecutor Slobodan Radovanovi and Interior Minister Ivica Dai agreed that the formation's chief "must be completely separated from politics of any kind, and all its interest groups". The man chosen to do the job is said to have worked on similar tasks with the police for years. He will be presented to the public in the coming days, the paper notes.
US Vice President’s visit to Balkans accompanied by tight security measures
US Vice President Joseph Biden has ended his three-day visit to Bosnia, Serbia and Kosovo, news agencies are reporting. Security in the Serbian capital was at its highest possible level for the visit, according to Interior Minister Ivica Dacic.
The minister asked citizens to show understanding for measures such as the closing of streets or bans on public gatherings during the visit, in places where the motorcade was due to pass, online paper Balkan Insight reports. “I get the impression that members of the public don’t understand adequately, or haven’t had it sufficiently explained to them, what
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Tight security around US Vice-President Biden |
security measures mean when it comes to certain events or individuals,” the online media cited Dacic.
Interior Minister Dacic and the Serbian Defense Minister Dragan Sutanovac, in preparations for Biden's arrival, attended an anti-terrorist exercise at the police held jointly by Serbian army and police, which also included a simulation exercise of an assault.
The security of the National Palace in Belgrade requested from all journalists, reporting the visit US Vice-President, to take off their shoes, Sofia News Agency marks. The meeting between Biden and his Serbian counterpart, Boris Tadic, went under tight security measures with all journalist undergoing thorough checkups twice, ones by the Serbian police and one more time by the US special agents, news agency expands. All buildings near the palace had sharpshooters on their roofs while Biden himself traveled in a specially equipped Cadillac.
Heavily armed US Secret Service agents accompanied Joe Biden during his visit to Decani, the biggest Serbian Orthodox monastic brotherhood worldwide. In addition to Italian soldiers who normally guard it, many secret service agents accompanied Biden inside the compound. Some heavily armed agents remained on guard as he went inside for talks, although a few took a tour of the church to admire its magnificent frescos, Reuters reported.
Bulgarian right-winge parties turn against European elections hopefuls with Communist secret police past
The coalition of the two biggest right-wing parties in Bulgaria has called on all runners in the forthcoming European Parliament elections to withdraw from their ballots candidates with the Communist state security records, Sofia News Agency reports.
"It is unacceptable that Bulgaria is represented by people, who collaborated with the Communist-era secret police," reads the statement, issued jointly by the Democrats for Strong Bulgaria and Union of Democratic Forces. It points out that the European Parliament officially condemned the Communist regime, which is responsible for the destruction of hundreds of thousands of lives across Europe.
A special panel, investigating Bulgaria's communist-era police files, released earlier in the week the names of agents and collaborators, who are running for members of the European Parliament in the upcoming elections in June, news agency marks. These are Yunal Lyutfi from the ethnic Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms, Evgeni Kirilov, who is even now European Parliament member on the ticket of the Bulgarian Socialist Party, Stanislav Stanilov from the nationalist Ataka, Nikolay Zahariev, Alexander Marinov, Yordan Velichkov and Hristo Mermerski from Protection union and Hristo Matanov from Forward Movement.
Bulgaria's Communist-era security service is believed to have remained potent after the fall of Communism with the ex-operatives closely linked to the political and business establishment, Sofia News Agency points out.
FSB experts neutralized powerful explosive device at gas pipeline in Russia’s
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Dagestan
An explosive device found in the Kayakentsk area of Russia’s Dagestan on the site of gas pipeline Moszok-Kazimagomed, is neutralized, news agency Interfax reports. The detonator of the bomb was destroyed by a shot from a water gun, the device was destroyed by undermining of the unprofitable charge, according to a spokesman of the security forces.
He told the news agency that the self-made explosive was installed in a plastic bucket filled by ammoniac saltpeter and alluminium powder; it was supplied by an electric detonator.
The explosive device was neutralized by experts of the Federal Security Service (FSB) of Russia Dagestan directorate. As a result of undermining a small deformation was formed on the gas pipeline, according to the security forces spokesperson. The repair team has to replace about five meters of the pipeline, he added.
The source in Dagestan’s law enforcement expanded that the capacity of the neutralized explosive incorporated under the gas pipeline was about 5-6 kg in TNT equivalent.
Risk of buying votes in forthcoming elections high in Latvia – Security Police
On the eve of the European Parliament and municipal elections in Latvia, the risk of buying of votes is rather high, the Security Police of Latvia has concluded, according to online paper Delfi. The situation has been aggravated by the complex state of the country’s economy, spokesperson of the Security Police Kristine Apse-Krumina told Delfi.
In connection with forthcoming elections a session of workers of corresponding establishments was held to provide agreed actions with an aim of prevention of violations. Latest years’ experience shows that criminals can try to bribe voters directly or indirectly, for example, having put pressure through their employers, according to Apse-Krumina. The Security Police believes that this year attempts of pressure upon voters will dominate during the electoral campaign.
Expert on East German state security service speaks out on revealing of explosive Stasi papers
Dr. Helmut Müller-Enbergs, researcher in the Birthler Office, discovered “explosive state security service documents” together with his colleague Cornelia
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Karl-Heinz Kurras today |
Jabs, German daily Bild reports. They exposed the West Berlin policeman Karl-Heinz Kurras who shot student Benno Ohnesorg in 1967 as a East German Communist state security service (Stasi) member. The researched explained to Bild how he had hunted out the documents. They searched for unofficial members of the Stasi who had connection with deaths. One month ago the researchers found 17 volumes related to Karl-Heinz Kurras among many other documents.
The Stasi had put these files into archives as confidential. This was something very special within the East German Stasi. In the state security service data bank a reference was found to a tape containg recording a woman’s report on a dead person by the Berlin Wall. The determining reference to confidential files was added to the tape. The first volumes contained information on Kurras and his explanation of obligations. Other 15 volumes were working files, informers’ reports on the West Berlin police.
Müller-Enbergs told the paper that the volume of 1967 had definitively gaps. The file was put into archives only in 1970 and one can only speculates which documents were destroyed.
The researchers did not find reference to the fact that the Stasi gave Kurras a particular murder order. But the Stasi knew that Kurras had a shooting hobby and he was a very good shooter. They paid for his ammunition and gave him a weapon. In March, 1976 Kurras should have tried once again to take up the old connection with the Stasi again.
The papers show that Kurras received for his spying 550 DM in 1955, 800 DM next year, 2,310 DM in 1960, 2,200 DM in 1961, then already 4,500 DM in 1966. During the first two months of 1967 he got 2,000 DM, in May it was 1,000 DM.
Kurras is 81 years old now and lives in Berlin-Spandau. According to Berlin newspaper Tagesspiegel, the pensioner denies that he has collaborated with the East German Stasi. However, then all documents would have to be faked, starting from the handwritten obligation explanation up to his Stasi identity card. Judging from his 2007 interview to the magazine Stern, Kurras does not regret the the youth’s death at the Berlin Wall.
In two court proceedings Kurras was acquitted in 1967 and 1970 of the reproach of the careless killing. A few days after the deadly shots Kurras asked the Stasi for money for a lawyer. The historian and SED (East Germany’s Communist party) expert Hubertus Knabe told the Bild that the fact that researchers had happened Kurras files only now showed “the mess that ruled in the archive”.
No real threat to Ukraine’s territorial integrity, SBU Chairman concludes
The head of Ukraine’s State Security Service, SBU, Valentyn Nalyvaychenko said Ukraine posed no serious challenges to its territorial integrity from neighbors, The Kyiv Post reports. "No, such threat, real threat, does not exist," he said appearing on the Inter TV channel.
According to Nalyvaychenko, risks rather exists from Ukraine’s political parties, commonly pro-Russian extremist groups, which seek to unite the Crimea and other parts of Ukraine with Russia, and some receive foreign backing. The SBU, however, had been successfully cracking down on these organizations, Nalyvaychenko said insisting they posed no serious threat, according to Kyiv Post.
"All four criminal cases launched on these organizations, which were challenging our territorial integrity, are today being heard in Ukrainian courts," the paper cites the SBU head who expressed hope that courts would impose legal bans on such organizations. Nalyvaychenko said the SBU was aware of plans to hold a referendum in the Crimea which could be used by separatists to split the peninsula away from Ukraine.
Book written by former secret service vice-chief banned in Kazakhstan
The book entitled Godfather-in-Law, published this month in Germany in Russian and German and written by Rakhat Aliyev, President Nursultan Nazarbayev`s former son-in-law and the ex-Deputy Chairman of country’s security committee, has been banned in Kazakhstan.
Online paper Javno reports that Kazakhstan’s authorities have warned they would prosecute anyone caught buying, selling or reproducing the book written by Aliyev who fled the Central Asian country in 2007 after falling out with President Nazarbayev. Aliyev lives in self-exile in Austria and has been sentenced in absentia to 40 years in prison by a Kazakh court on a number of serious charges.
Saparbek Nurpeisov, a spokesman for the Prosecutor General's office, told reporters the book contained libellous statements, breached the right of privacy and revealed state secrets. "Those who do not have access to these secrets are not allowed to know its (the book's) contents," Nurpeisov said. The basis for the ban is a law adopted in July 2000 called Immunity of the First President of the Republic of Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan's National Security Committee (KNB) is handling the case, he marked. The book is not officially on sale in Kazakhstan.
The book is full of allegations and documentation about the Kazakhstan's President since independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. One of the documents from Aliyev's book purportedly shows a letter from the KNB to Nazarbaev, detailing what it says are US efforts to undermine the country by supporting free media, including Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty's Kazakh Service.
Otegen Ikhsanov, the former chairman of Kazakhstan's Supreme Court committee, told RFE/RL that Aliyev might have violated Kazakh law by disclosing state secrets. But he said the government was going too far by threatening to punish people for reading or talking about the book.
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