site.btaPM, Interior Minister, Prosecutor General Discuss Probe Into Unlawful Wiretapping of Participants in 2013-14 Anti-Government Protests

PM, Interior Minister, Prosecutor General Discuss Probe Into Unlawful Wiretapping of  Participants in 2013-14 Anti-Government Protests


Sofia, February 9 (BTA) - Prime Minister Boyko Borissov met here
Monday with Prosecutor General Sotir Tsatsarov and Interior
Minister Vesselin Vouchkov to discuss reports from a probe into
the wiretapping of participants in last year's protests against
the government of Plamen Oresharski. The meeting was reported to
the press by the government press office which explained that
the report contained classified information and no details can
therefore be made public.

Protestors were placed under surveillance as of an operation
codenamed "Worms".

The Interior Minister informed the Prime Minister of some
violations of the rules on use of surveillance which have been
established by the Surveillance Control Bureau as part of a
check the Minister has ordered at the Ministry's Security
Department.

The Prime Minister reportedly commented that the conclusions in
the Interior Ministry reports cause a far greater concern that
the information that has been made previously public.

Confirming the suspicions of Protest Network over illegal
wiretapping, the head of the parliamentary internal security
committee, Atanas Atanassov, said last week that participants in
the protests were put under surveillance for 300 days in an
operation involving the Interior Ministry, the State Agency for
National Security and the State Agency for Technical Operations.

Prime Minister Borissov expressed satisfaction with the work of
the Interior Minister, the government press office said.

Interior Ministry chief secretary Svetlozar Lazarov has denied
any knowledge of such wiretapping and the Interior Minister in
the Oresharski government, Tsvetlin Yovchev, dismissed the
allegations altogether.

Prosecutor General Tsatsarov told reporters that prosecutors
have been working on the case long before the Worms Case came to
light. He declined to provide further information and said more
details should be expected when the probe is completed. LN/LY