Slovak Police Accuse Security Forces of Kidnapping

BRATISLAVA (Reuters) - Slovak police said on Monday that senior officers in the state secrurity service (SIS) had coordinated the kidnapping in 1995 of the son of former President Michal Kováč. They also said they wanted to bring charges against former ..

BRATISLAVA (Reuters) - Slovak police said on Monday that senior officers in the state secrurity service (SIS) had coordinated the kidnapping in 1995 of the son of former President Michal Kováč. They also said they wanted to bring charges against former Interior Minister Gustáv Krajči for abuse of power in a separate incident. Officials would not say whether former Prime Minister Vladimír Mečiar himself would face charges in connection with either of the two cases. The abduction of Michal Kováč Junior, whose father was an arch political foe of Mečiar, was one of the biggest political scandals in post-communist eastern Europe and provoked outrage at home and consternation abroad. Two former SIS top officials were taken into custody earlier on Monday, and police said they would apply for the removal of parliamentary immunity from Ivan Lexa, who was head of the SIS until becoming a deputy for Mečiar‘s party after the general elections in September. Mečiar was so closely allied to Lexa that he even gave up his parliamentary seat to him after losing the elections. Deputies are immune from prosecution unless parliament decides to suspend their privileges. Police were also expected to ask parliament to remove immunity from Krajči, who was accused of abusing his power when interior minister by ignoring a constitutional court ruling and undermining a referendum on NATO membership and presidential elections in 1996. "In the coming days, the investigator will ask parliament for permission to press charges against Ivan Lexa, who is suspected of criminal acts concerning the abuse of power," the head of the Interior Ministry‘s investigation department, Jaroslav Ivor, told a news conference on Monday. "The investigator will also ask for permission for charges against Gustáv Krajči, on suspicion of criminal acts in thwarting the referendum, abuse of power and fraud," Ivor added. Asked whether Mečiar himself could come under investigation, Ivor said: "At the current stage of the investigation, I can neither confirm, nor exclude this possibility." In August 1995, Kováč junior was seized by masked men, force-fed whisky, given electric shocks, dumped in the boot of a car and whisked off to neighbouring Austria. A Viennese court said at the time that the Slovak authorities might have been behind the kidnapping, and two senior Slovak police investigators were sacked after saying members of the SIS had orchestrated the abduction. Outrage at the kidnapping and the thwarting of the referendum was heightened after Mečiar used extraordinary amnesty powers last year to try to prevent any future prosecutions. The amnesties were abolished by the new government which has promised to re-democratise Slovak society and investigate alleged abuses of power under Mečiar‘s administration.

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