INTERVIEW GIVEN BY THE SECURITY-INFORMATION AGENCY DIRECTOR TO THE WEEKLY TELEGRAPH (NEDELJNI TELEGRAF) No. 504 ON DECEMBER 12, 2005


THEY ARE PULLING US INTO POLITICAL CLASHES

During the last weeks in the Belgrade media, several articles and information appeared in which it was asserted that the secret police taps members of the Serbian National Assembly. Some party leaders gave statements asserting that they were victims of the Security-Information Agency which was followed by the wave of demands to disband the Security-Information Agency (hereinafter the BIA).

In the interview given to the Weekly Telegraph the Director of our secret police Rade Bulatovic on the direct question whether the BIA has taped the Serbian MPs said:

- Those articles are false. It is a complete fabrication that comes from a group of people that spread fear of the secret service, and who try with such tricks and campaigns to distinguish themselves and to find their place in the public arena. I responsibly assert that the BIA does not tap MPs, not single one of the 250 of them, nor will it ever tap. The Service neither taps the members of a famous Group 22. On that occasion, we gave an official statement and denied such articles, but we were forced, because of the need to tell the truth, to submit a request to the Prosecutor’s Office to bring criminal charges because of harassing the public and spreading lies.

* How many decisions a year does the BIA get from the competent court as a permit for secret tapping of people? Whom does the BIA tap?

- Yearly, we get the minimum of needed permits for practicing this work method. I would also stress that we get significantly less decisions than in the previous period. We tap people that come into conflict with the law and those that endanger the national security.

* The thesis emerged that you continue with the continuity of the RDB (State Security Service) and that you behave as a repressive state organ. Because of that, we publicly suggest to you to get rid of old personnel and to employ completely new people.

- We are a specific state institution that in one of its purviews, for example the work methods, maintained the continuity with the former state security services. After year 2002, a serious discontinuity with the former service and personnel was carried out in the BIA, and with the objectives and the methods of our work. It is known that the BIA has from its operations ejected, for example, the category of internal and political enemy, political emigrants and dissidents. Moreover, the BIA has turned over to the History Archive all the documents and files on people that were politically persecuted in Serbia during the last decades.

* But the BIA maintained both personnel and working methodology from Tito’s to Milosevic’s Service and the DOS State Security Service?

- The BIA is not fast food service, to be able to prepare new generation of inspectors for one day or a month. At least three to five years are necessary for the training of one secret service inspector, after which he would still be a beginner. That is the reason why we still have old personnel. Nevertheless, one must not forget that we have many new people. For the last one and a half year, the period that I am the Director, some 25 percent of employees left the Agency. A significant part left the Service before my appointment, during years 2002 and 2003. In the meantime we employed 150 new people all of them with a university degree and they are all today engaged in the operational line of work.

* How much is the BIA a party police, and how much a secret service that protects citizens and the country of foreign agencies and international terrorism?

- I do not know why a part of the public has the impression that the BIA is a party police. In the course of the last year and a half the BIA has not influenced any event on the internal political arena. It has been in the function of protecting all Serbian citizens and the national security. What some people assert that the BIA is the police that persecute its people is the consequence of the use of the cliché from former periods or, even, the need of some leaders, who lost their credibility to create for themselves new political position. If their assertions are a sign that the BIA is powerful, then it is good. However, I believe that it is more a sign of irresponsible public appearance of some politicians and self-proclaimed security analysts, who are dragging us into their political conflicts.

* The belief reigns that the BIA persecutes more than it protects its citizens?

- The Agency was not prepared to publicly defend itself from the practice to frighten people with the secret service. I acknowledge that we were a little closed for public, but we are trying to change that. More and more citizens are getting in touch with us and are giving their remarks and suggestions.

* And what are our people informing the security police?

- Nothing special, more precise nothing that is of a great importance for the work of the BIA. This phone number is for now in the experimental operation phase and citizens still do not know what kind of information they need to inform us. They mainly denounce criminal acts and criminals that are under the authority of the Ministry of Interior.

* In the reports that you submit to the Assembly Security Committee there is not much information on how many foreign agents the BIA has discovered or thwarted their work or detained them in Serbia?

- That field of work is according to regulations secret. Nevertheless, our estimates indicate that the activities of foreign services in the last period have intensified, but not as much as it is often asserted and exaggerated in the public. In the last months, there was neither more severe blow form a foreign service on the security of Serbia, nor has the BIA conducted actions on discovering and detaining foreign agents.

* Do the foreign services destabilize Serbia, for example, through placing and initiating different scandals or conflicts on our political arena?

- Not as much as some people that publicly exaggerate the importance of foreign factor in Serbia think or how much they wish it to be. It is difficult to free one from implanted prejudices that things that are happening to us originate from foreign spy pots. We are always spreading rumors of world plots.

* Does and if yes, how much does the BIA cooperate with foreign agencies and services, with the aim to protect the national security?

- The BIA closely cooperates with 46 foreign services in the domain of countering international terrorism and organized crime. We have conducted several different types of joint actions against terrorists and international criminals, and the most important was the operation of seizing Abdelmaid Bouchar, Al-Qaeda collaborator from Spain. Our Agency is evaluated as the stabilization factor of the security situation on the Balkans. After all, it is clear to everyone that without such international cooperation of secret services today no country can be safe.

* There were critics that it was not the BIA that detained Bouchar, but a diligent police officer with a large moustache in the train.

- Exactly, that an ordinary police officer being able to detect and detain a dangerous terrorist is the main point of an established security system operation! The security of our country begins at the border. The BIA had the information on Al-Qaeda members transiting through Serbia.

* It is often mentioned in the international security institutions and NATO that BiH is one of accomplices of Islam terrorists that have shelter also in Kosovo and Metohija (here in after Kosmet). How much is such information accurate?

- They are mainly accurate. Recently, in BiH a group of international terrorists was detained that had certain connections in Sandzak and Kosmet. However, besides the BIA, about that buckle that connects Islamists in BiH and some parts of Serbia the international security forces take care of that. Therefore, I do not expect that that link shall further strengthen.

* When the assassination was attempted on Vuk Draskovic, individuals from the RDB of Serbia declared that the service needs to eliminate certain Albanian terrorists and associates. Recently, nevertheless, there are talks about the operation of the Albanian lobby in Belgrade. What are the estimates, what is going to happen in Kosmet and southern Serbia when the negotiations commence in Vienna?

- I do not wish to comment on the RDB work, because in that period I was not in Belgrade. Today, there are no problems with Albanians in the capital city. We do not have information on an operation of a national Albanian lobby. Estimates are that the begging of negotiations shall create a tense atmosphere both in Kosmet and in southern Serbia. In Kosmet, however, the international forces keep the situation in their hands, and the situation in southern Serbia is stable. There were no interethnic incidents and conflicts. The BIA has discovered and seized in that area large amount of old and buried weapons and ammunition and in that way reduced the risk of its use.

* Nonetheless, in the very center of Belgrade there were attempts to place explosive devices in front of the Presidency building of Serbia or the airport. How does the BIA struggle against such cases the so-called internal terror?

- The preventive counter-sabotage defense, especially of high state officials is under the competence of the BIA. We do not have information or estimates on serious threats, to not only the president or the prime minister, but also other high state representatives. Only one serious threat existed against one of the ministers, but we have eliminated it. Generally, our officials are safe and not one of them is personally threatened. Safe are also other public and eminent individuals. This internal terror as you have named it is completely eradicated. We have solved almost all murder cases in Serbia. After the assassination of Bata Bulatovic, the secretary of FS SCG (Football Association of the Serbia and Montenegro) there was no other secrete murder in Serbia, which demonstrates its stability.

* During the last visit to Belgrade, the Hague prosecutor Carla Del Ponte asked about Ratko Mladic and Goran Hadzic. The minister of interior Dragan Jocic told that MUP continuously searches for them. What about the BIA?

- I can only comment that search for war crime indicted, even for Mladic and Hadzic, falls under our authority and we are giving complete contribution for the fulfillment of this task. The BIA regularly informs the Serbian Government and other state organs about this.

* In Serbian, press articles appeared that the BIA is in a sense polarized about the question of cooperation with the ICTY. Namely, that one current in the BIA tries to locate and detain Mladic, and Karadzic and the other to protect them.

- It is another completely untrue thesis about the BIA: the Agency and all its staff members act uniformly, professionally and without restraints with regard to meeting all legal obligations, including those concerning the ICTY.

* This year we have faced the inter-ethnic incidents and neo-Nazi activities in Vojvodina. Why did you not warn the state and political leaderships that the inter-ethnic conflicts were going to escalate in the Province?

- We monitored every incident that broke out in Vojvodina and concluded that neo-Nazism had not escalated. Judging by the inter-ethnic incidents, which neither increased in number nor more severe than incidents of previous years, the situation in Vojvodina is safe. There are no indications that the inter-ethnic relations might be disturbed. The extremists, who attracted attention both of the BIA and some other international factors, are not strong and dangerous enough to jeopardize the security situation.

* There are rumours that the neo-Nazi in Vojvodina were activated from the outside by foreign agencies and that the BIA consequently reacted and made a list of all members of these groups.

- They were neither incited from the outside nor did the BIA make a list of the neo-Nazi groups’ members. All kinds of extremists, including the right-wing ones, represent a filed of interest both of the public and secret police. We did not take any special action against them.

* What does the Draft Law on Insight into Files of Security Services stipulate? How will possible abuses, including political abuses of these files and ‘leakage’ of information into the public, be prevented?

- According to our Draft Law, the files would be handed over to the Archive of Serbia and the Law should prevent any kind of data abuse. We believe it is understood that beside personal usage by individuals in question these files might be used only in scientific purposes.

* Serbia is in a period of big decisions, including decisions on the status of the State Union, the status of Kosmet, the demand for changing the status of Vojvodina … How much will all these issues influence the destabilization of Serbia?

- It depends on the evolution of these processes, in which atmosphere and circumstances they will proceed. If these issues are solved in a democratic way, the security of Serbia will not be endangered. However, if the processes exceed a democratic framework, they might become a potential threat. Nowadays, Serbia is a stable and secure country, what many representatives of the international community confirm. The IMF representatives have officially confirmed that Serbia is safe for foreign investments, flow of capital and movements. This means that it is also capable of dealing with possible security risks.


THE DIRECTOR WITHOUT A DEPUTY

* What is the structure of the Agency’s leadership? Who are your closest associates?

- My closest associates are two special advisors. The first is Mr. Sveto Koprivica in charge of the counter-intelligence and counter-terrorism. He has a B.S. in economics and has been working in the Service for years. The second is Mr. Radenko Novakovic, with a B.A. degree in law and is in charge of the intelligence, i.e. collecting political, economic, security and other information concerning the foreign factor important for the security of Serbia. He is also an experienced operative of the Service. Both of them are honorable people, without a stain in their careers. According to the BIA’s structure, I do not have assistants but I have a deputy, whom we are currently looking for. The position of the Deputy Director has been empty for several reasons but we are working towards appointing one of the experienced operatives of the Agency.

* Several days ago, a member of the BIA was arrested in Pozarevac being charged with extortion. Has the Agency begun struggling against corruption within its ranks? If it has, which are its ways of struggle?

- The Agency is decisively struggling against such phenomena. Object of this case is a firearm-shooting instructor, who was sentenced with the termination of his labor contract as soon as the information about his criminal act had been received. The BIA is a part of the society so that it also includes individuals who have committed various criminal acts. The number of such persons in the Agency is very small but we have estimated even that number as dangerous. Criminal proceedings were initiated against all those persons and they were eliminated from the BIA, which honestly speaking formerly was not the practice.


ORGANIZED CRIME EXISTS BUT IS NOT OMNIPOTENT

* How much does the BIA help the Police and Judiciary to solve the cases of murders of Slavko Curuvija and Milan Pantic who are alleged to be victims of the very Secret Service i.e. organized crime?

- The BIA immediately gives the Ministry of Interior of Serbia all the information, which it gains through different channels, particularly information on murders. All the documents concerning the activities of the State Security Department in Curuvija case, which had been in the possession of the BIA, were also handed over to the Police i.e. to the Organized Crime Directorate (UBPOK). These documents were declassified. The BIA did not keep anything, meaning that it did not try to hush up the case. The UBPOK has been investigating whether the murder of Slavko Curuvija might be connected with certain members of the RDB.

* There were rumors that the BIA and the UBPOK were disputing for a while over competences in certain enquiries.

- I do not know what the situation had been before I came to the Agency but I claim that we do not have any misunderstanding with the colleagues of the Organized Crime Directorate. We give the UBPOK about 95% of information and material that we collected on all kinds of crime in Serbia. The BIA fulfils its part of the task so that there is no room for envy, vanity, conflicts or misunderstandings. We have great cooperation with the Criminal Police Department also as with the entire Ministry of Interior. Our cooperation with the National Security Agency of Montenegro is excellent too. We are leading a joint struggle against organized crime involved in smuggling drugs, stolen cars and illegal migrants from Montenegro into Serbia.

* In which case did you cooperate with the UBPOK the last time? How does the BIA evaluate the situation of organized crime in Serbia nowadays?

- We were jointly working on a bribe case of a judge of the Supreme Court. We estimate that organized crime in Serbia is still rather powerful but not omnipotent any more since it does not have support in political structures. In the long run, organized crime without politicians can not strengthen but only weaken.


ALL DECISIONS COME FROM BELGRADE

* What is the current organizational structure of the BIA?

- Our structure and budget are not secret for the public. The BIA’s Headquarters are in Belgrade, including nine Departments, Training Centre, Security Institute and Communication Centre. Beside that, we have 16 regional centers in all bigger towns in Serbia. The biggest ones are in Novi Sad and Nis.

* What is the management coordination between the Headquarters in Belgrade and the regional centers? One can get the impression that in the provinces some Service members might be ‘working’ for the local authorities or certain politicians.

- The BIA is a republic institution directly connected with the Government of Serbia and all our regional centers are directly connected with Belgrade. It means that they have nothing to do with the local authorities, political parties or politicians. According to the orders upon which they operate, coordination between the Headquarters and the regional centers as well as their control is carried out directly so that the BIA members cannot do anything without the decisions being reached in Belgrade. There was not a single case of a Service member ‘acting’ independently without authorization and for the benefits or in the interest of a political party or politician. The BIA is completely depoliticized. According to the law, its staff must not be members of political parties. As the Director, I am not a member of any political party and I was not a member of the JUL as some people claimed. One of the main recruitment conditions is that candidates must be non-party persons.


NOBODY FROM GOVERNMENT CALLS ME

* What kind of pressure are you exposed to as the leading man of the secret police? Do the Government members, MPs or media exert pressure on you?

- Not a single member of the Serb Government has ever called me to ask or suggest something outside my legal competences. I have never felt pressure by politicians or members of the Parliament. I am only under the pressure by self-proclaimed security analysts and certain media that publish groundless reports on the BIA’s work and my alleged political engagement. Some of them call for dissolution and extinction of the Security Information Agency claiming that the same was done in some countries, which is not true. In my opinion, it is an attack on our security service.

* Where will you continue your professional career after the expiry of your term of office in the BIA?

- After the BIA I see myself in the diplomacy again!