Analysis: Australian intelligence agency’s conduct played key role in Mossad operative’s decision to commit suicide

Ben Zygier was a victim. From details that have already been published by British and Australian media we learn that he was a victim of his own personality and also of the over-enthusiasm and lack of caution on the part of his handlers in Israel. Most infuriating is the fact that people who worked for the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO) purposely got the Mossad operative in hot water and indirectly contributed to his decision to commit suicide.

According to the details that have surfaced so far, Zygier and two of his colleagues, who were also born in Australia and held Australian citizenship, were recruited to Mossad at the beginning of the last decade. After a few years of service in Europe, the three were sent back to Australia to obtain new, authentic passports. Australian law allows a person to change his name and have a passport issued under the new name every calendar year. The three took advantage of this law, ASIO claims, to obtain a number of passports under various names that concealed their Jewish identities and presented them as Australians with an Anglo-Saxon background.

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Many questions remain unanswered / Ron Ben-Yishai

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Zygier, for instance, had four passports issued during the four years he had spent in Australia. The Australians claim Mossad needed these passports to allow fighters and spies to enter enemy states such as Iran and Syria and carry out missions under false identities. Apparently Zygier and his friends were not sent on missions in these “target states” themselves, but their passports were used by other people who operated under assumed names. Zygier was not in Dubai, as the Kuwait newspaper claimed.

These events occurred at the time of the al-Aqsa Intifada, when Mossad increased its activity regarding the monitoring and thwarting of the Iranian nuclear program, and at the same time prevented the smuggling of weapons and terror attacks initiated by Iran – such as the transfer of arms and aid to Syria, Hezbollah and the Palestinian organizations. This activity increased significantly after then-prime minister Sharon appointed Meir Dagan as Mossad chief in 2002 and instructed him to focus on Iran.

During this time a number of embarrassing work accidents occurred that angered some of Israel’s allies. One such incident occurred in 2004 in New Zealand, one of Australia’s closest allies. Another incident was the assassination of Mabhouh, Hamas’ smuggler, during which it was revealed that Mossad operatives made extensive use of authentic passports belonging to Jews, including Australian Jews – at least this is what the Dubai police chief claimed. During this time, the ASIO also claimed that an Israeli diplomat from the embassy in Canberra took advantage of romantic relations to gather information on the activities of the Australian government. The diplomat, Amir Laty, was deported from Australia in 2005. Against this background, Australian government offices were apparently instructed to raise their level of alertness regarding Israeli activity to gather information, and in 2009 the government office in charge of issuing passports warned of the frequent name changes by Zygier and his colleagues.

The warning was relayed to ASIO, which apparently began to follow the three and later summon them for questioning. According to Australian newspaper The Age and another newspaper based in Brisbane, Zygier became the main suspect following things he said during the interrogation or due to details revealed by one of his colleagues. However, this occurred before the diplomatic crisis between Israel and Australia that broke out following the Mabhouh assassination. Seemingly, there was no reason for Australia to act against Zygier because he did not commit any acts of espionage on its soil or collect any information on the country.

The ASIO is tasked only with foiling subversive and terrorist activity against Australia. Apparently, the intelligence agency had no evidence indicating that the passports issued for Zygier were used illegally. It is also possible that the Australian government chose to turn a blind eye for the benefit of the close ties between Mossad and ASIS, Australia’s intelligence agency that operates overseas.

But at least some ASIO officials apparently had their own agenda, and they were not willing to give up on the Israeli prey so easily – perhaps due to frustration, damaged professional pride or simply because they were anti-Israel. Or maybe they realized that Zygier was the weak link in the story and thought that more pressure would break him and cause him to reveal all of his activities on behalf of Mossad. It appears that the two other Australian Jews who were interrogated did not disclose enough information, prompting the ASIO to use the media as a tool to apply more pressure.

The plan was to have the media attack Zygier in order to convince him that his activities had been exposed and there is no point in getting in trouble with the Australian authorities by continuing to conceal them. The ASIO investigation was launched in the summer of 2009. Mabhouh was assassinated in February 2010. At the end of that month The Age published an article on how three young Israelis holding Australian citizenship were given passports with false names which they used to enter Iran, Syria and Lebanon.

The reporters who wrote the article were Jason Koutsoukis and Jonathan Pearlman, who had visited Israel for work and were familiar with the Israeli scene. Koutsoukis did not try to hide the fact that their source was an Australian intelligence officer. To justify the surveillance of the Jews with the dual citizenship, reporters were told that as a student, Zygier was in contact with students from Saudi Arabia and Iran. The reporters were essentially being told that Zygier was spying for Israel on Australian soil and should therefore be followed.

Zygier was in Israel when the Australian intelligence officer leaked the information to Koutsoukis. According to all accounts, he returned to Israel willingly and even reported to his superiors in Mossad that he was interrogated in Australia. It is safe to assume that he also informed Mossad that his colleagues had been questioned as well. But even before the Mabhouh assassination, Koutsoukis called Zygier and asked about the passports and his activity in the service of Mossad. Koutsoukis claims an “anonymous source” in Israel gave him Zygier’s phone number. It is entirely possible that this source was not Israeli.

In any case, in his conversation with the reporter Zygier denied working for Mossad, but Koutsoukis got the impression that Zygier would eventually tell him the entire story. The reporter continued to call, and Zygier may have softened and told him of his work for the Israeli intelligence agency.

At a certain point it was decided that there was enough evidence to justify an arrest and an investigation. The rest is known. Zygier was held in isolation under an assumed name because the names on the various passports, including his real name, were known. Zygier was not a senior Mossad operative. It is not surprising that Zygier, a passionate Zionist, could not bear the guilt and committed suicide. He did not betray the country; he simply could not live up to his own expectations and those of his family and his surroundings. The burden became too heavy for his tormented soul.

…

Published: 02.17.13, 12:10 / Israel Opinion

Find this story at 17 February 2013

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Did Ben Zygier, the Australian-Israeli identified by Australian media last week as the mysterious “Prisoner X” who died in Israeli prison in 2010, also have British citizenship?

Australian reporter Jason Koutsoukis broke the story in February 27, 2010 that the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO) had been investigating three Australian-Israelis suspected of links to Mossad. He confronted two of the (unnamed) men about the allegations, quoting one in his 2010 report:

“I have never been to any of those countries that you say I have been to,” he said. ”I am not involved in any kind of spying. That is ridiculous.”

The same man is also believed to hold British citizenship, and is believed to have come to the attention of British intelligence after he had changed his name.

Now see what Koutsoukis told The Guardian last week, after the Australian Broadcasting Company aired an investigation suggesting that Prisoner X who had died in Israel’s Ayalon prison in December 2010 was Ben Zygier :

At the time Zygier said: “I have never been to any of those countries that you say I have been to, I am not involved in any kind of spying. That is ridiculous.”

So we now know the man who told Koutsoukis in 2010 “I have never been to those countries” was Zygier. And that Koutsoukis indicated that he had been told at the time– presumably by Australian intelligence–that Zygier had also previously come on the radar of British intelligence for taking out a passport in a new name.

If Koutsoukis’ original information was correct, that Zygier also had British citizenship and another British alias, it would be interesting to know what the British government and intelligence services might know about the case and how Israel came to suspect that Zygier was compromised.

Update: Why did Israel move to arrest Zygier in February 2010? One possible theory is also suggested by information in Koutsoukis’s February 27, 2010 report.

In the piece, that came out days after Zygier was secretly detained, Koutsoukis writes:

In January the Herald visited the offices of the European company that connects the three men.

The company’s office manager confirmed to the Herald that one of the men being monitored by ASIO – the same man believed to hold a British passport – was employed by the company but was “unavailable”.

The company’s chief executive later emphatically denied that this man was ever employed by his company, and totally rejected that his company was being used to gather intelligence on behalf of Israel.

ASIO said it had no comment to make on the case.

So in January 2010, the head of an alleged Mossad front company allegedly involved in selling communications equipment to the Middle East discovers that a foreign reporter seems to know about it and the name of one of the men associated with it. We now know the name Koutsoukis gave the alleged front company was Zygier’s. (Koutsoukis’ home was broken into a day after he confronted Zygier in early 2010, he told Israel’s Channel 10 last week.)

How did Koutsoukis get the name of the firm? Likely from his ASIO source, who originally called him in October 2009. How did ASIO get it? Hypothetically, it seems possible that Zygier might have given the name of the firm to ASIO under questioning about suspected passport fraud. (Zygier had reportedly been in Australia in the fall of 2009 attending an MBA program at Monash University.)

(It’s not clear to this reporter if that is the kind of disclosure that Mossad would consider a serious breach, or not, given Australia and Israel are allies. Some Israeli sources have insisted that Zygier must have committed some more serious transgression, with intent, involving an entity hostile to Israel, to have been treated so severely. Other Israeli journalists and former officials, however, seem to believe Zygier was compromised by officials with the Australian security service. Australia’s ASIO “burned” Zygier to Koutsoukis, YNet analyst Ron Ben-Yishai wrote Sunday, amid a series of actions by Mossad in Australia that deeply angered Canberra. Former Israeli intelligence official Michael Ross agrees.)

However Koutsoukis learned of it, Mossad would, after Koutsoukis’ visit to the company in January 2010, soon have been aware that there had been a serious compromise of the firm and all associated with it.

…

(For more on the Prisoner X case, see Ron Ben-Yishai, ABC (Part I) and (Part II), The Age, Daoud Kuttab, Yossi Melman, and the Guardian.)

Posted on February 17, 2013 by Laura Rozen

Find this story at 17 February 2013

© 2013 AL-MONITOR

This morning I spoke to SBS Radio Australia’s Greg Dyett about the mysterious case of Ben Zygier, an Australian-born naturalized citizen of Israel, who is said to have killed himself in 2010 while being held at a maximum-security prison near Tel Aviv. As intelNews reported on Wednesday, Zygier, who is believed to have been recruited by Israel’s covert-action agency Mossad, had been imprisoned incommunicado for several months and was known only as ‘Prisoner X’, even to his prison guards. Is there any connection between Zygier’s incarceration and the January 2010 assassination of Palestinian arms merchant Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, in Dubai? And what could Zygier have done to prompt Israel to incarcerate him? You can listen to me discuss this mysterious case in an eight-minute interview here, or read the transcript, below.

Q: You say that, after conferring with your contacts in Israel, Europe and the United States, you believe that Ben Zygier had some sort of involvement in the assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai in January 2010.

A: Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was a weapons procurer for the Palestinian militant group Hamas. At this point, there is little doubt that the Mossad was behind this operation. Several members of the team that killed al-Mabhouh were using third-country passports —Irish, British, Australian, and others— to travel to and from Dubai. In the aftermath of the assassination, there were questions about how the Mossad operatives managed to get those passports; and, if you’ll remember, that led to the expulsion of several Israeli diplomats from around the world, including Australia. At least four of those who conducted the assassination were using Australian passports. It appears that, although Zygier himself was not necessarily involved with the assassination on the operational level, he must have possessed significant knowledge about how these passports are actually obtained by the Mossad. And the general sense seems to be that his imprisonment in Israel is connected with his knowledge of how exactly this system works in Israel.

Q: What could he have done that would have prompted Israel to incarcerate him?

A: In order to answer that question one has to be aware of what is perhaps the main practical intelligence concern for Israel. The primary operational terrain for Israeli intelligence activities is of course the Middle East and North Africa. However, the problem Israeli intelligence agencies face —the Mossad in particular, which is Israel’s primary covert-action agency— is that Israeli officers cannot travel to most of the Arab world [or Iran], because Israeli passports are not accepted there. Because of this, Israeli intelligence agencies, including the Mossad, are constantly in a sort of desperate need for high-quality travel documents, which are considered indispensible in their work. Without them, they cannot fulfill their intelligence mission. So, procuring passports, especially from Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, is seen as highly important. Such passports are highly coveted because these countries are seen as politically neutral and their passports do not carry the baggage that you get when you carry, say, an American or an Israeli passport, especially around the Middle East. Therefore, a person like Zygier, if he had knowledge of how the system works and how exactly Israeli intelligence procures these passports, would have been absolutely critical for the operational cohesion of an agency like the Mossad.

Some people tend to think that, because Zygier was incarcerated in Ayalon, the same prison and the same cell that was built specifically for the person who killed Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995, his crime must have been comparable in magnitude to killing an Israeli political leader. Now, I personally don’t think so. I think what he must have done is somehow compromised himself by collaborating with a foreign intelligence agency in the weeks or months following the al-Mabhouh assassination. Now, was that agency the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation? Was it perhaps the authorities in Dubai, who were investigating the al-Mabhouh assassination? Did he perhaps decide for some personal ethical reason to turn into some sort of whistleblower, reminiscent of Mordechai Vanunu, who in 1986 spilled the beans about Israel’s nuclear weapons program? That is, of course, an unanswered question. But I think the answer has to do with one of those three possibilities.

Q: If we go back to December 2009, an Australian journalist had the first of several telephone calls with Zygier, in which he put to Zygier that he had information that he was one of three Israeli-Australians involved in the production of false identity documents, like passports. What seemed interesting to me was the fact that Zygier was prepared to engage with that journalist to the point of taking several telephone calls from him between December 2009 and January the next year, shortly before the [al-Mabhouh] assassination on January 19 and just a month before Zygier was jailed in February.

A: Yes, this is very interesting, indeed. I think that if Zygier —and it seems almost certain at this point— was recruited by Israeli intelligence, when he received that call his world must have collapsed, because for someone like him, operational discretion would have been of the utmost importance. However, he did engage with the journalist and did continue to be in communication with him. This might perhaps point to Zygier not being a full-time operations officer for the Mossad, but rather a recruit —an asset— somebody recruited for a particular operation with an expiration date, who then falls into a sleeper-agent-type mode until he is recalled. It could also point to the possibility that Zygier was involved with the Mossad but seemed to have some kind of ethical concerns about the use of Australian passports to conduct assassinations around the world.

Incidentally, you might argue that his discovery by the press was not necessarily his own fault, but rather the fault of his Israeli handlers. His name was leaked to the press in Australia, probably by Australian intelligence, which was alerted by the fact that Zygier traveled back to Australia at least four times to legally change his name and to request new Australian passports, which he then must have used to travel around the world. That raised flags for Australian counterintelligence, which must have realized at some point that the Mossad had asked Zygier to anglicize his name so that he could travel to the Middle East without appearing to be in any way connected to Israel [or Judaism]. That is sloppy intelligence work, any way you look at it.

Q: Now, attention has been pointed to the fact that Zygier was being held in a supposedly suicide-proof prison cell. Would Israel have any motivation in wanting to kill this gentleman?

A: I really don’t think so. Let us take the gravest possibility, namely that Zygier had actually compromised himself —had collaborated with an intelligence agency of a country considered by Israel to be an adversary. In that possibility, the Mossad would have nothing to gain from his death. In a case like that, once the compromised officer or agent is incarcerated, he is seen as a card, which you can use to exchange with your agents or officers who might have been captured abroad. So he would be very useful in that respect. In addition, once he was considered essentially a defector-in-place —someone who collaborated consciously with a foreign intelligence agency— the Mossad would have had a lot more to gain by interrogating him for many, many years. Through this process, it could gain valuable information about the mode of operation of that adversary intelligence agency, which would be far more productive than actually killing him. So there is nothing to be gained by simply killing a compromised officer of the kind of Zygier.

[The last question, below, and the corresponding answer, were not aired as part of the SBS segment]

Q: Do you think we will ever find out the truth behind this story?

A: Yes. I am very optimistic that we will eventually find out a lot more information than we currently have available about this case. It is interesting how, in the hours after the initial revelation of Zygier’s identity by ABC Australia, a lot of Israeli news media received telephone calls by the office of the Israeli Prime Minister, requesting emergency meetings to discuss the case. In those meetings, the media were urged to exercise restraint and were warned of “very dramatic repercussions” to Israel’s security if more about this case was released. …

February 15, 2013 by intelNews

Find this story at 15 February 2013

Alleged Australian-Israeli agent, who reportedly killed himself in jail here in 2010, said to have been held in solitary on suspicion of treason

Jason Koutsoukis, a reporter for Australian’s Fairfax newspapers, began an investigation into Ben Zygier — aka “Prisoner X,” who is said to have committed suicide in Ayalon Prison in 2010 — in 2009, when an anonymous source fed him information regarding a Mossad front company that was operating in Europe and selling goods to Iran, the Guardian reported Wednesday evening.

According to the Guardian report, the source gave Koutsoukis the names of three Australians with joint Israeli citizenship who were working for the Mossad. The alleged agents were said to be selling electronics to Iran through a company based in Europe.

In 2009, Koutsoukis said, he contacted Zygier at his home in Jerusalem and confronted him with allegations of the story.

“The company did exist,” Koutsoukis was quoted as saying. ”I also managed to establish that Zygier and another of the individuals had worked for it. I wasn’t able to confirm the third name.”

According to Koutsoukis’s account, Zygier changed his name four times in Australia. Although Australian law permits changing one’s name legally once a year, Australian authorities grew suspicious and were beginning to close in on Zygier, Koutsoukis said.

Koutsoukis reported in 2010 that two Australian intelligence sources told him that the Australian Security Intelligence Organization was investigating three Australians who had emigrated to Israel in the last decade and who had changed their names and requested new passports.

“The three Australians share an involvement with a European communications company that has a subsidiary in the Middle East. A person travelling under one of these names sought Australian consular assistance in Tehran in 2004,” he reported at the time in the Sydney Morning Herald.

After a Mossad hit squad reportedly killed senior Hamas weapons importer Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai in January 2010, Koutsoukis decided to confront Zygier and telephoned him, the Guardian report said.

“When I spoke to him he was incredulous at first and said f*ck off – but what was interesting was that he did not hang up,” Koutsoukis said. “He did soundly genuinely shocked. But he listened to what I had to say.

“I still wonder why he didn’t hang up. He denied everything, however. He said he hadn’t visited the countries it had been claimed he had. I tried calling again but in the end he told me to buzz off.”

Koutsoukis said he also had a series of bizarre exchanges with the CEO of the alleged front company. He reported that the company’s office manager confirmed that one of the three Australians was being monitored by the ASIO.

“He seemed a bit weird. He denied all knowledge of what I was talking about, but then wanted to talk to me again and make an arrangement to meet up,” he later told the Guardian.

Koutsoukis claimed that a senior government official later confirmed the story, even though he had the opportunity to refute it.

Zygier was reportedly imprisoned later in 2010, a fact the Australian spy agency was aware of, according to The Australian. Australian Foreign Minister Bob Carr on Thursday acknowledged to the Australian Senate that Canberra was given assurances by Israel that Zygier’s rights would be respected.

“The Australian government was informed in February 2010 through intelligence channels that the Israeli authorities had detained a dual Australian-Israeli citizen – and they provided the name of the citizen – in relation to serious offences under Israeli national security legislation.” he said.

…

By Greg Tepper and Ilan Ben Zion February 14, 2013, 1:29 am 6

Find this story at 14 February 2013

© 2013 The Times of Israel

Channel 10: Iran and Syria will now be checking through their records, working out when Ben Zygier entered, who accompanied him, and who he met with

The exposure in the Australian media this week of alleged former Mossad agent Ben Zygier, who reportedly committed suicide in Ramle’s Ayalon Prison two years ago, could have very dramatic repercussions for ongoing Mossad operations, Israeli media reported on Wednesday night.

Assuming the information is accurate, the impact of the exposure of the alleged agent and his movements on behalf of Israeli intelligence in Iran, Syria and Lebanon, will have “very significant” consequences for ongoing work, Channel 10 news said.

In countries such as Iran and Syria, the authorities would now be checking through their records, working out when Zygier entered, who accompanied him, and who he met with, the TV report said.

The ABC Australia reporter who broke the story, Trevor Bormann, said in interviews on Wednesday that he was first told about the case in Israel by an Israeli source who said he had “a terrific story” to tell but couldn’t publish it in Israel because of “a gag order” surrounding the case. Bormann said he worked on the story for 10 months, putting the pieces together.

Some Hebrew media reports Wednesday night indicated that Zygier was initially exposed in 2010 by the Australian security authorities.

He immigrated to Israel in around 2000, and was subsequently recruited by the Mossad, they said.

During his years in Israel, Zygier, a lawyer by profession, also worked at the Herzog, Fox, Neeman law firm of Justice Minister Yaakov Neeman, Channel 2 reported.

In 2009, he went back to Australia and enrolled for a master’s degree at Melbourne’s Monash University, where he mingled with students from Arab countries, including from Saudi Arabia and Iran.

This attracted the suspicions of the Australian national security services, who called him in for questioning, the reports said, suspecting that he had used his Australian passport to spy for Israel. One Israeli media report on Wednesday night claimed Zygier admitted to the Australian interrogators that he was working for the Mossad, and then also told an Australian journalist. Another report said it was the Australian security services that “burned him” by leaking the story to a local Australian journalist. When this journalist called Zygier, he responded with an angry denial, insisting he had never been involved in espionage.

Three other suspected Mossad agents active at the Australian university campus were also questioned by the authorities, it was reported on Wednesday night. No further details were available.

Not long after he had been questioned, Zygier returned to Israel. He was subsequently arrested and held for eight months in Ayalon jail, in a cell originally designed for Yigal Amir, the assassin of prime minister Yitzhak Rabin. His jailers did not know his identity, the reports said. There was no definitive explanation for why he was taken into custody.

It was also not clear why he had committed suicide, although the speculation on Wednesday night was that it might have been a consequence of his exposure. There were unanswered questions, too, about how he had been able to take his own life on December 15, 2010 — reportedly via “asphyxiation by hanging,” according to a post-mortem carried out by the Abu Kabir center for forensic medicine outside Tel Aviv — in a cell with constant camera surveillance and other supervision.

Israel on Wednesday night confirmed that a suicide of a security prisoner occurred at the prison in late 2010, and ordered an investigation into possible negligence by the prison authorities.

Zygier was 34 when he died. His remains were sent to Melbourne for burial shortly afterward.

The handling of the affair in the past two days has come in for withering criticism from several Knesset members — some of whom used parliamentary privilege to bypass the gag order on Tuesday — and by unnamed government sources quoted in the TV reports on Wednesday night. These unnamed sources were quoted as saying that Tamir Pardo, the head of the Mossad, is out of touch with modern media, and mistakenly believed it would be possible to prevent reporting of the story by utilizing court orders and military censorship.

A Channel 10 report quoted government sources as saying that the military censor’s office — utilized to prevent publication of material damaging to Israel national security — should be closed down. Those who broke the law by publishing illegal information should be prosecuted via normal judicial processes, these sources suggested.

Channel 10 also said the sources intimated that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had panicked over the affair on Tuesday, when Israeli editors were summoned in an effort to suppress the story. Netanyahu was also said to have panicked when a Mossad attempt to assassinate Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal went awry in Amman in 1996 during his first prime ministership, and when details of the alleged Mossad assassination of Hamas weapons procurer Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai in 2010 began to leak out.

The Dubai incident, another episode that involved the alleged use of Australian and other foreign passports, has also been linked to Zygier, in a report in the Sydney Morning Herald.

“Israel claims to be the only democracy in the Middle East,” Australian reporter Bormann said Wednesday, but “when it comes to matters of security, it can be very heavy-handed.”

Attempting to assess the potential damage to Israeli-Australian relations, reports Wednesday night noted that the Australian authorities have not filed any formal complaint with Israel over the affair. It was noted that Israel reportedly did inform an official at the Australian Embassy of Zygier’s detention and suicide at the time, although this information apparently did not reach the Australian government.

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By Times of Israel staff February 13, 2013, 10:38 pm 7

Find this story at 13 February 2013

© 2013 The Times of Israel

Tip-off for journalist Jason Katsoukis led to espionage trail of Australian-Israeli spies, false passports and Zygier interview

The tombstone of Ben Zygier at the Chevra Kadisha Jewish cemetery, Melbourne, Australia. Photograph: Julian Smith/EPA

For Jason Katsoukis, the Australian journalist who first investigated allegations that Ben Zygier was a Mossad agent, the claims initially sounded “outlandish”.

In 2009, while living in Jerusalem and filing stories to the Australian Fairfax group, Katsoukis was contacted by an anonymous source with connections to the intelligence world.

The story that the source told over a series of conversations was indeed extraordinary.

The source named three Australians with joint Israeli citizenship whom, he said, were working for a front company set up by Mossad in Europe selling electronic equipment to Iran and elsewhere.

“I was tipped off in October 2009,” Katsoukis told the Guardian on Wednesday, recalling the events that would lead to his calling Zygier at his home in Jerusalem and accusing him of being an Israeli spy.

“The story was that Mossad was recruiting Australians to spy for them using a front company in Europe. It all seemed too good to be true.

“But what I was told seemed to check out. The company did exist. I also managed to establish that Zygier and another of the individuals had worked for it. I wasn’t able to confirm the third name.

“I was told too that the Australian authorities were closing in on Zygier and that he might even be arrested.

“There was other stuff about Zygier. In Australia you can change your name once a year. He’d done it four times I think, but they were beginning to get suspicious. I also found out that he had applied for a work visa for Italy in Melbourne.”

The repeated changes of name would have allowed Zygier to create new identities and multiple passports.

While Katsoukis was working on the story – still uncertain if it stacked up – something happened that encouraged both his editors and Katsoukis himself to bring forward their contact with Zygier.

In January 2010, a Mossad hit squad murdered the Hamas official Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, in Dubai.

It emerged that the team had been supplied with false passports from a number of countries including Germany, Ireland and the UK, apparently confirming the very practice Katsoukis was investigating.

“The feeling was that we should go to Zygier and put the story to him. It wasn’t difficult to find him. He’d was back in Jerusalem so I called him at home.

“When I spoke to him he was incredulous at first and said fuck off – but what was interesting was that he did not hang up. He did soundly genuinely shocked. But he listened to what I had to say.

…

Peter Beaumont
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 13 February 2013 18.35 GMT

Find this story at 13 February 2013
© 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.

AN AUSTRALIAN diplomat knew that Melbourne man Ben Zygier was being held in an Israeli prison before he died in his cell, the government has admitted, amid explosive reports that Mr Zygier was a Mossad agent known as ”Prisoner X”.

Foreign Minister Bob Carr was forced into an embarrassing backflip on Wednesday as he ordered his department to investigate the Zygier case.

His office was forced to correct earlier claims that the Australian embassy in Tel Aviv knew nothing of the case until after Mr Zygier died in prison in December 2010 when his family – a prominent Jewish family in Melbourne – asked for his body to be repatriated.

Do you know more about this story or Ben Zygier? Email us here

In a revelation that raises questions about the extent of the Australian government’s knowledge, Senator Carr’s spokesman said an Australian diplomat – who was not the ambassador – was aware that Mr Zygier, 34, was being held by Israeli authorities.

The revelation follows a report by the ABC’s Foreign Correspondent that said Mr Zygier was the notorious ”Prisoner X”, an inmate held in the utmost secrecy in a special section of Israel’s maximum security Ayalon prison.

The report stated that Mr Zygier, a husband and father of two, moved to Israel around 2000 and became a Mossad spy. But the report said something went tragically wrong with his intelligence activities and he eventually committed suicide in a tightly guarded cell, where he was being held in solitary confinement.

His father, Geoffrey Zygier, executive director for B’nai B’rith Anti-Defamation Commission, did not comment on Wednesday.

The government acknowledges Mr Zygier died in jail but Senator Carr’s spokesman could not confirm that it was Ayalon prison. The Foreign Affairs Department refused to say who the official was or when they knew of the case.

As Fairfax Media reported in 2010, ASIO was investigating at least three dual citizens for their links to Mossad. We reveal now that Mr Zygier was one of them.

The issue has sparked a political storm in Israel, where opposition politicians demanded Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lift a veil of secrecy surrounding Mr Zygier’s death and brief the Knesset foreign affairs and defence committee.

Outgoing Justice Minister Yaakov Neema vowed that ”if true, the matter must be looked into”.

…

With TOM ARUP and STEPHEN CAUCHI

David Wroe and Ruth Pollard
Published: February 14, 2013 – 12:01PM

Find this story at 14 February 2013

Copyright © 2013 Fairfax Media

Lawyer claims Australian-born suspected Mossad spy was considering plea bargain

Ben Zygier, the suspected Mossad spy previously known only as Prisoner X, was “rational” and “balanced” the day before he apparently hanged himself in a maximum-security Israeli prison, one of his lawyers has said.

Avigdor Feldman told Israel’s Channel Ten that Australian-born Mr Zygier had been considering a plea bargain offered by prosecutors. “I met with a balanced person … who was rationally weighing his legal options,” said Mr Feldman, adding that his client denied the “serious” charges he was facing. The exact nature of the charges remains unknown.

On Wednesday, after Australia’s ABC TV aired a documentary revealing Prisoner X’s identity, Israel admitted for the first time that it had secretly detained a man with dual citizenship for security reasons. However, it did not explain how Mr Zygier, 34 – who emigrated to Israel in 2000, married an Israeli woman and fathered two children – managed to kill himself while under 24-hour surveillance in a cell designed to be “suicide-proof”.

The cell was built to hold Yigal Amir, the ultra-Zionist who assassinated then Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995. Cameras inside the cell were supposed to be monitored around the clock, and Israeli newspapers have reported the room contained sensors to monitor temperature and heartbeat.

The Israeli Justice Ministry said that an inquiry had been ordered into possible negligence.

Mr Zygier’s family in Melbourne have declined to comment, but Harry Greener, a friend of Mr Zygier’s father, Geoffrey, a respected Jewish community leader, told Fairfax Media: “We all knew there was something suspicious and underhanded about Ben’s death.” Mr Greener said: “I think there should be justice for Ben, to find out what happened – because nobody really knows.” Mr Zygier had been a “friendly, warm, outgoing” person, he said, and his death had “gutted’ the Jewish community. Mr Zygier’s uncle, Willy, a musician, told ABC local radio in Melbourne that the saga was a “family tragedy”.

…

Kathy Marks
Thursday, 14 February 2013

Find this story at 14 February 2013

© independent.co.uk

Im Fall “Häftling X” werden mehr Details bekannt, als Israel lieb sein kann. Er gibt Einblicke, wie der Auslandsgeheimdienst Mossad gezielt Agenten mit Doppelstaatsbürgerschaft einsetzt, um in arabischen Ländern zu spionieren – und Tarnfirmen für Operationen zu nutzen.

Tel Aviv – Die Affäre um den “Häftling X” sorgt in Israel für Aufregung. Dabei geht es nun nicht mehr allein darum, ob der israelisch-australische Doppelstaatsbürger und Mossad-Agent Ben Zygier heimlich in einem Hochsicherheitsgefängnis festgehalten wurde, bis er mutmaßlich Selbstmord beging.

Der Vorfall bringt weitere Details ans Tageslicht, die Israel lieber verborgen wüsste: Er gibt Einblicke in die Operationsweise des israelischen Auslandsgeheimdiensts im Feindesland.

Viele arabische Länder und Iran stehen mit Israel offiziell auf Kriegsfuß, sie lassen israelische Staatsbürger nicht einreisen. Doch gerade diese Länder sind es, die natürlich besonders im Visier des Mossad stehen. Wie also dort vorgehen? Der Fall “Häftling X” liefert auf diese Frage einige Antworten.

Agenten reisen mit zweiter Staatsbürgerschaft

Offenbar sind für den Mossad als Agenten vor allem israelische Doppelstaatsbürger interessant – besonders Australier. “In Australien kann man einmal im Jahr seinen Namen ändern”, erklärte der australische Journalist Jason Koutsoukis SPIEGEL ONLINE. Koutsoukis enthüllte, dass Ben Zygier für den Mossad arbeitete. “Zygier hatte bereits rund viermal in Australien seinen Namen geändert”, sagte Koutsoukis. Der Australier soll ab 2000 für den Mossad gearbeitet haben.

Die israelischen Agenten agieren dann im Ausland offenbar unter ihrer zweiten Staatsbürgerschaft wie wohl bei der mutmaßlichen Mossad-Operation in Dubai im Januar 2010. Damals wurde in einem Hotel Mahmud al-Mabhuh erst betäubt und dann mit einem Kissen erstickt. Der Palästinenser galt als Waffeneinkäufer der radikalislamistischen Hamas. Bis zu 29 Verdächtige listeten die Behörden von Dubai – sie haben britische, irische, französische, australische Reisepässe. Ein Verdächtiger reiste mit deutschem Pass.

Israels Auslandsgeheimdienst nutzt offenbar Tarnfirmen

Noch brisanter sind die Erkenntnisse, dass der Mossad möglicherweise komplette Firmen im Ausland aufbaut und als Tarnunternehmen nutzt, um seine Agenten ins Feindesland zu schleusen.

So haben Ben Zygier und mindestens ein weiterer Australier nach Erkenntnissen von Jason Koutsoukis für eine Firma gearbeitet, die in Europa ihren Sitz hatte und Elektrotechnik unter anderem an Iran verkaufte.

Dies wirft die Frage auf, ob Zygier möglicherweise bei der “Operation Olympische Spiele” mitarbeitete – einem Cyberwaffen-Programm, das nach Berichten der “New York Times” Israel und die USA ab 2006 gemeinsam entwickelten, um das iranische Nuklearprogramm zu schädigen.

Das bekannteste Instrument der “Operation Olympische Spiele” ist der Computerwurm Stuxnet, der ab etwa Juni 2009 zum Einsatz kam und vor allem Computer in Iran schädigte. IT-Experten vermuten, dass Stuxnet gezielt die Zentrifugen in Irans Atomanlage Natans ausschalten sollte. Auch das Schadprogramm Flame, das hauptsächlich Computer in Iran und im Libanon befiel, soll Teil der “Operation Olympische Spiele” sein.

Wie es gelang, Stuxnet in die Atomanlage zu schmuggeln, ist unklar. Möglicherweise sind die europäischen Mossad-Lieferanten für Elektrotechnik ein Teil der Antwort.

In Zygiers Zeit fallen heikle Mossad-Missionen

In Zygiers Zeit beim Mossad fallen einige der wohl heikelsten Missionen, die dem israelischen Auslandsgeheimdienst zugeschrieben werden. Unter Meïr Dagan, der den Mossad ab 2002 bis Ende 2010 leitete, wurden die Operationen im Ausland massiv ausgeweitet, sie wurden riskanter und aggressiver. Zu den Aktionen, bei denen der Mossad als Drahtzieher in Frage kommt, gehören etwa auch die Ermordung des Hisbollah-Mitglieds Imad Mughnija 2008 in Damaskus und die Ermordung iranischer Atomwissenschaftler in Teheran.

…

14. Februar 2013, 18:47 Uhr

Von Raniah Salloum

Find this story at 14 February 2013

© SPIEGEL ONLINE 2013

Ben Zygier, Melbourne man known as Prisoner X, also questioned by reporter over spying before death in 2010

Ayalon jail, in Ramle, near Tel Aviv, where Ben Zygier was held incommunicado. He was found hanged in his cell. Photograph: Nir Elias/Reuters

Extraordinary new details emerged on Wednesday about the alleged double life of Ben Zygier – known as “Prisoner X” – an Australian-Israeli national and reported Mossad agent, who died after being secretly detained in an Israeli prison in 2010.

In the midst of an escalating diplomatic storm over the 34-year-old’s treatment and the revelation that he was being investigated by Australian authorities as a suspected Israeli agent who used Australian passports for operations, it emerged that he was confronted shortly before his arrest by an Australian journalist who accused him of being a spy.

As the scandal over Zygier’s suicide, while being held incommunicado in Ayalon prison, continued to grow in Israel and Australia, it was also revealed by Australian news organisations that he was under investigation by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation [ASIO] as one of three citizens suspected of using of Australian passports on behalf of Mossad.

More details of the case emerged as the Israeli government partially lifted its blanket ban on reporting any details of Zygier’s imprisonment, first imposed by an Israeli court after his arrest.

Zygier, who was married to an Israeli and had two young children, was found hanged in his cell in late 2010. His body was flown to Melbourne for burial the following week.

In Israel the case has triggered demands by opposition politicians, human rights groups and the media for Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to supply more information about the man’s imprisonment and death, and to reform its antiquated and authoritarian military censorship rules.

When the story about Prisoner X first emerged, Israeli media said the unidentified man was being held incommunicado at Ayalon high-security prison in the wing built to accommodate Yigal Amir, the assassin of the Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin.

While the case remains deeply murky, the new revelations will be deeply embarrassing to Mossad, not least because they have lifted the lid again on how the Israeli spy agencies acquire cover identities for agents.

In the last three years the Mossad department charged with providing cover identities has been caught out in a series of high-profile bungles as it has been found to have been improperly using foreign passports for its operations.

The details came only a day after an ABC documentary revealed Prisoner X’s identity for the first time, and after ham-fisted efforts by Netanyahu’s office to prevent reporting of the story by Israeli media messily backfired.

According to The Age, Zygier had applied for Australian passports using three identities over the years – those of Ben Alon, Ben Allen and Benjamin Burrows.

The new details about Australian suspicions that Zygier was a Mossad agent came as the Australian government was forced to backtrack on claims that it had no knowledge of his arrest and to admit that Israeli officials had briefed Australian diplomats over the case.

There has still been no official explanation for why Zygier was secretly imprisoned without trial, and information on his case ruthlessly suppressed. But speculation is growing that he may have offered to provide information to a foreign power.

It is still not clear whether Zygier was actively working for Mossad, or whether he simply acquired passports for the spy agency to use in its overseas operations.

According to The Age, Zygier had been approached by a Fairfax journalist after being tipped off that the Australian intelligence agency ASIO was investigating three dual national citizens who had emigrated to Israel, on suspicion that the men had used Australian passports to spy for Israel in Iran, Syria and Lebanon – which is illegal under Australian law.

Zygier, known as Benji, was approached by the reporter Jason Koutsoukis shortly before his arrest in 2010 and asked whether he was an Israeli spy after being accused of travelling back to Australia to change his name and obtain a new Australian passport.

At the time Zygier said: “I have never been to any of those countries that you say I have been to, I am not involved in any kind of spying. That is ridiculous.”

In recent years the issue of both Mossad operations involving citizens of friendly nations and use of passports of allies, has become a source of serious friction with governments usually friendly with Israel.

“There are informal rules,” said one person familiar with intelligence co-operation arrangements. “You inform your allies if you want to speak to someone or do something. There is a feeling the Israelis don’t play by the rules.”

…

Peter Beaumont and Alison Rourke in Sydney
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 13 February 2013 17.32 GMT

Find this story at 13 February 2013
© 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.

JERUSALEM — The story had all the trappings of a spy thriller: an anonymous prisoner linked to Israel’s secret service, Mossad, isolated in a top-security wing originally built for the assassin of a prime minister. A suicide — or was it a murder? — never officially reported. A gag order that barred journalists from even acknowledging the gag order. And a code name to rival 007: Prisoner X.

The first reports about the death of Prisoner X leaked out in 2010, both in Israel and the United States, where a blogger identified the mystery man as a former Iranian general. Government censors immediately forced an Israeli news site to remove two items related to Prisoner X — and journalists were interrogated about it by the police.

On Tuesday, after an extensive Australian television report identifying Prisoner X as an Australian father of two who became an Israeli spy, the prime minister’s office summoned Israeli editors to a rare meeting to remind them of the court order blocking publication of anything connected to the matter.

It remains unclear what Prisoner X might have done to warrant such extreme treatment — and such extreme secrecy, which human rights groups have denounced as violating international law. What is clear is that the modern media landscape makes the Israeli censorship system established in the 1950s hopelessly porous: the Australian report quickly made the rounds on social media, prompting outraged inquiries from opposition lawmakers on the floor of Parliament.

“The Israeli public will know sooner or later what happened,” declared Nahman Shai, a Parliament member from the Labor Party.

Aluf Benn, the editor of the Israeli daily Haaretz, said the government forced him and another news organization to delete items about the Australian reports from their Web sites on Tuesday. Later, Haaretz posted an article on the unusual editors meeting and the parliamentary discussion.

“They live in a previous century, unfortunately,” Mr. Benn said of the Israeli administration. “Today, whatever is blocked in news sites is up in the air on Facebook walls and Twitter feeds. You can’t just make a story disappear. I hope that they’re more updated in whatever they do professionally.”

The prime minister’s office and prison service declined on Tuesday to comment. “I can’t tell you anything; I’m not dealing with this,” said the prison spokeswoman, Sivan Weizman. “I can’t answer any question about it. Sorry.”

The Australian report, a half-hour segment based on a 10-month investigation that was broadcast Tuesday on the ABC News magazine program “Foreign Correspondent,” identified Prisoner X as Ben Zygier and said he had used the name Ben Alon in Israel. Mr. Zygier immigrated to Israel about a decade before his death at age 34, married an Israeli woman and had two small children, according to the report.

“ABC understands he was recruited by spy agency Mossad,” read a post on the Australian network’s Web site. “His incarceration was so secret that it is claimed not even guards knew his identity.” Mr. Zygier “was found hanged in a cell with state-of-the-art surveillance systems that are installed to prevent suicide,” it said, adding that guards tried unsuccessfully to revive him and that he was buried a week later in a Jewish cemetery in a suburb of Melbourne.

A spokeswoman for the Australian government said in an e-mail that its embassy was unaware of the prisoner’s detention until his family asked for help repatriating the remains, and that she could not “comment on intelligence matters (alleged or actual).”

The Australian report builds on news items from 2010 that described the death of Prisoner X in solitary-confinement cell 15 in a part of Israel’s Ayalon Prison said to have been created especially for Yigal Amir, who killed Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995. Prisoner X was not allowed visitors or a lawyer, according to those reports.

Richard Silverstein, an American blogger, claimed in 2010 that Prisoner X was Ali-Reza Asgari, a former general in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and a government minister, who had previously been reported to have defected to Israel and cooperated with Western intelligence agencies. On Tuesday, Mr. Silverstein acknowledged his error, saying his source apparently was part of “a ruse designed to throw the media off the scent of the real story.”

Bill van Esveld, a Jerusalem-based analyst with Human Rights Watch, said the reports suggested a serious violation of international law. “That’s the most basic obligation you can think of, not disappearing people,” he said. “You can’t take somebody into detention, deny any knowledge of them, and not allow their families to be in communication with them, not allow them to see a lawyer or have any due process. That’s what needs to be looked into.”

Dov Hanin, a member of Parliament from the left-wing Hadash Party, on Tuesday questioned Israel’s justice minister, Yaakov Ne’eman, about Prisoner X, asking: “Are there people whose arrest is kept a secret? What are the legal monitoring mechanisms in charge of such a situation? What are the parliamentary monitoring systems in charge of such a situation? And how can public criticism exist in cases of such a situation?”

Mr. Ne’eman replied that the matter did not fall under his jurisdiction, but said, “There is no doubt that if true, the matter must be looked into.”

…

February 12, 2013
By JODI RUDOREN

Find this story at 12 February 2013

© 2013 The New York Times Company

Evidence has been unearthed that strongly suggests Israel’s infamous Prisoner X, who was jailed under extraordinary circumstances in 2010, was an Australian national from Melbourne.

Investigations by the ABC’s Foreign Correspondent program have revealed Ben Zygier, who used the name Ben Alon in Israel, was found hanged in a high-security cell at a prison near Tel Aviv in late 2010.

His body was flown to Melbourne for burial a week later.

The death goes part of the way to explain the existence in Israel of a so-called Prisoner X, widely speculated in local and international media as an inmate whose presence has been acknowledged by neither the jail system nor the government.

The case is regarded as one of the most sensitive secrets of Israel’s intelligence community, with the government going to extraordinary lengths to stifle media coverage and gag attempts by human rights organisations to expose the situation.

Watch the full Foreign Correspondent report on Prisoner X on iview.

The Prisoner X cell is a jail within a jail at Ayalon Prison in the city of Ramla. It was built for the assassin of Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin.

The ABC understands Mr Zygier became its occupant in early 2010. His incarceration was so secret that it is claimed not even guards knew his identity.

Israeli media at the time reported that this Prisoner X received no visitors and lived hermetically sealed from the outside world.

When an Israeli news website reported that the prisoner died in his cell in December 2010, Israeli authorities removed its web pages.

An Israeli court order prohibiting any publication or public discussion of the matter is still in force; Israel’s internal security service, Shin Bet, has effectively blocked any coverage of the matter.
Secret imprisonment
Photo: Bill van Esveld has described the secret imprisonment of Prisoner X as “inexcusable”. (ABC)

Foreign Correspondent can reveal that Mr Zygier was 34 at the time of his death and had moved to Israel about 10 years earlier. He was married to an Israeli woman and had two small children.

Mr Zygier’s arrest and jailing in Israel remains a mystery, but the ABC understands he was recruited by spy agency Mossad.

It is understood Mr Zygier “disappeared” in early 2010, spending several months in the Prisoner X cell.

At the time, human rights organisation Association for Civil Rights in Israel criticised the imprisonment and wrote to Israel’s attorney-general.

“It’s alarming that there’s a prisoner being held incommunicado and we know nothing about him,” wrote the association’s chief legal counsel Dan Yakir.

The assistant to the attorney-general wrote back: “The current gag order is vital for preventing a serious breach of the state’s security, so we cannot elaborate about this affair.”

Contacted by the ABC, Mr Yakir would not comment on the case, quoting a court order gagging discussion.

It’s called a disappearance, and a disappearance is not only a violation of that person’s due process rights – that’s a crime.
Human rights advocate Bill van Esveld

Bill van Esveld, a Jerusalem-based advocate for Human Rights Watch, has described the secret imprisonment of Prisoner X as “inexcusable”.

“It’s called a disappearance, and a disappearance is not only a violation of that person’s due process rights – that’s a crime,” he told Foreign Correspondent.

“Under international law, the people responsible for that kind of treatment actually need to be criminally prosecuted themselves.”

Mr Zygier’s apparent suicide in prison adds to the mystery. He was found hanged in a cell which was equipped with state-of-the-art surveillance systems installed to prevent suicide. Guards reportedly tried unsuccessfully to revive him.

His body was retrieved and flown to Melbourne. He was buried in Chevra Kadisha Jewish cemetery in the suburb of Springvale on December 22, seven days after his death.

Mr Zygier’s family has declined to speak to the ABC, and friends and acquaintances approached by Foreign Correspondent in Melbourne have also refused to comment.
Mossad activity
Video: Former ASIS agent Warren Reed speaks to ABC News 24’s The World (ABC News)

Australia’s domestic intelligence agency ASIO has long scrutinised Australian Jews suspected of working for Mossad.

The agency believes Mossad recruits change their names from European and Jewish names to “Anglo” names. They then take out new passports and travel to the Arab world and Iran, to destinations Israeli passport holders cannot venture.

Warren Reed, a former intelligence operative for Australia’s overseas spy agency ASIS, told Foreign Correspondent that Australians were ideal recruits for Mossad.

“Australians abroad are generally seen to be fairly innocent,” he said.

“It’s a clean country – it has a good image like New Zealand.

“There aren’t many countries like that, so our nationality and anything connected with it can be very useful in intelligence work.”

The Department of Foreign Affairs has confirmed that Mr Zygier also carried an Australian passport bearing the name Ben Allen.
‘Allegations troubling’

When told details of Foreign Correspondent’s investigation, Foreign Minister Bob Carr said he was concerned by the claims.

“Those allegations certainly do trouble me,” Senator Carr said.

“It’s never been raised with me. I’m not reluctant to seek an explanation from the Israeli government about what happened to Mr Allen and about what their view of it is.

“The difficulty is I’m advised we’ve had no contact with his family [and] there’s been no request for consular assistance during the period it’s alleged he was in prison.”

Senator Carr says in the absence of a complaint by Mr Zygier’s family, there is little for the Australian Government to act upon.

However the transgression came about, it would have to be involved with espionage, treachery – very, very sensitive information that known to others would pose an immediate threat to Israel as a nation state.
Former ASIS operative Warren Reed

International conventions spell out that when a foreigner is jailed or dies, their diplomatic mission must be informed.

Senator Carr claims Australian diplomats in Israel only knew of Mr Zygier’s incarceration after his death.

Mr van Esveld says it is inexcusable for the Australian Government not to be notified.

…

Foreign Correspondent By Trevor Bormann

Updated Wed Feb 13, 2013 3:07pm AEDT

Find this story at 13 February 2013

© 2013 ABC

Security officials suspect that Ben Zygier, the alleged spy who died in a secret Israeli prison in 2010, may have been about to disclose information about Israeli intelligence operations, including the use of fraudulent Australian passports, either to the Australian government or to the media before he was arrested.

Mr Zygier ”may well have been about to blow the whistle, but he never got the chance”, an Australian security official told Fairfax Media.

Sources in Canberra are insistent that the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) was not informed by its Israeli counterparts of the precise nature of the espionage allegations against Mr Zygier. However, it is understood that the Melbourne law graduate had been in contact with Australian intelligence officers.

Israeli intelligence informed ASIO of the arrest and detention of Mr Zygier just eight days after authorities in Dubai had revealed that suspected Israeli agents had used fraudulent Australian passports in the assassination of a Palestinian militant.

The consequent crisis in Australian-Israeli intelligence relations provided the context in which the Australian diplomats did not seek consular access to Mr Zygier, who was regarded by Australian security officials as a potential whistleblower on Israeli intelligence operations.

The Foreign Affairs Minister, Bob Carr, on Thursday revealed that the government learnt of Mr Zygier’s detention through ”intelligence channels” on February 24, 2010. He told a Senate estimates hearing that Israel had ”detained a dual Australian-Israeli citizen – and they provided the name of the citizen – in relation to serious offences under Israeli national security legislation”.

Fairfax Media has been told by security sources that ASIO’s liaison office in Tel Aviv was notified of Mr Zygier’s detention by the Israeli security agency Shin Bet. It is understood that ASIO promptly notified the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), including the ambassador to Israel, Andrea Faulkner.

However, officials were unclear when or whether the then foreign minister, Stephen Smith, was briefed. Senator Carr’s office declined to respond when asked on Thursday about the government’s precise knowledge of Israeli allegations about Mr Zygier and the reasons for his secret detention. As no request for consular assistance was made by Mr Zygier or his family, the matter was left to intelligence liaison channels. No consular contact was made with Mr Zygier, and Australian diplomats did not become involved in the matter until after his reported suicide in prison in December 2010.

Mr Zygier’s detention came at an increasingly tense time in Australian-Israeli relations.

On February 16, 2010, Dubai authorities revealed that suspected Israeli agents had used Western passports in a covert operation that resulted in the assassination of Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in the United Arab Emirates.

News of the Israeli passport fraud caused a strong reaction from the then prime minister, Kevin Rudd. On February 25, according to a US diplomatic cable published by WikiLeaks, DFAT told the US embassy in Canberra that ”Australian officials are ‘furious’ all the way up the chain of command over the incident, and Prime Minister Rudd has vowed to get to the bottom of it”.

Australian Federal Police investigators travelled to Israel to pursue the Dubai passport fraud case, and that was followed by a visit to Tel Aviv by ASIO director-general David Irvine, who met Israeli intelligence chiefs. Mr Irvine subsequently provided a classified report to the government on the passport fraud issue.

However security sources have told Fairfax Media that the ASIO director-general did not raise the case of Mr Zygier.

Senator Carr told the Senate hearing that the Australian government sought ”specific assurances” that Mr Zygier’s legal rights would be respected and the government relied on these assurances. DFAT on Thursday declined to provide details of these exchanges.

…

Philip Dorling
Published: February 15, 2013 – 10:35AM

Find this story at 15 February 2013

Copyright © 2013 Fairfax Media

He was “a double agent working for Iran”; he was “responsible for the botched operation in a Dubai hotel in 2010” in which Mossad agents killed a senior Hamas commander; he was “just a loud mouth who couldn’t keep quiet” about being a member of Israel’s secret service. These are some of the many theories about why Ben Zygier, or “Prisoner X” as he was known until last week, was held in Israel’s most secure prison for a few months before apparently killing himself in December 2010. His detention was kept so secret that even his guards didn’t know his name; his presumed crime so grave that even his family haven’t gone public about his case.

Zygier’s name, and indeed his existence, would not have been known had it not been for an investigation by Foreign Correspondent, a programme produced by Australia’s ABC television, which unearthed details about the Israeli-Australian. They disclosed that his body was returned to his native Melbourne just before Christmas (and just after the birth of his second daughter) in 2010.

What Foreign Correspondent did not reveal was why Zygier was secretly jailed, a void that the Israeli government has not been eager to fill. So what exactly did this keen Zionist, a volunteer in the Israeli army, do to warrant such treatment? He was held in solitary confinement in the cell designed for Yigal Amir, the killer of the then Israeli Prime Minister, Yitzhak Rabin, and had access to nothing but a few books. Even Australian officials in Canberra admitted last week that they were unaware of Zygier’s case, despite his status as an Australian national.

The lack of official information has inevitably been filled by speculation. Because of the timing, the first theory was that Zygier had been involved in the operation in Dubai to kill the Hamas agent Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in January 2010. Zygier was arrested just a month later.

Several countries were outraged when it was revealed that some of the Mossad agents had travelled on fake passports – indeed, Australia expelled an Israeli diplomat in the aftermath. Was Zygier responsible for the images of Mossad agents being captured by CCTV? Was he responsible for bungling the passports? Or, more seriously, did he get turned by domestic security agents, as a Kuwaiti newspaper suggested last week?

One of the men who took part in the Dubai mission was Joshua Daniel Bruce, almost certainly an alias. The picture in a forged passport identifying Bruce appears to be of a man about the same age as the then 34-year-old Zygier, and of the 26 suspects he bears the greatest resemblance to Zygier. But on Friday a forensic facial recognition report commissioned by Reuters showed that Zygier and Bruce are not the same person, but it does not entirely dismiss the idea that Zygier was somehow involved in the Mabhouh operation.

At the beginning of 2010, the Australian journalist Jason Katsoukis uncovered evidence that Zygier was one of three Israeli-Australians running a front company in Italy, which ostensibly sold electronic equipment, to Iran among others. Zygier denied being a Mossad agent when asked by Mr Katsoukis, but it seems likely that he was working on contacts within the Sunni group, Jundallah, which has launched attacks against the Shia Iranian government.

Could Zygier’s incarceration be linked in some way to the arrest in February 2010 of Abdolmajid Rigi, the leader of Jundallah? Did Rigi blow Zygier’s cover and tell Iranian officials about the operation in Italy? In an interview with the Iranian Press TV after his arrest, Rigi said that American and Israeli agents were trying to persuade Jundallah to take their fight to Tehran. Rigi was eventually hanged, but what did he tell the authorities in Iran first?

…

Alistair Dawber
Sunday, 17 February 2013

Find this story at 17 February 2013

© independent.co.uk

Bart Debie, gewezen veiligheidsadviseur van het
VB en voormalig Antwerps politiecommissaris, verklaarde vandaag dat hij drie jaar lang informant van de staatsveiligheid was. Hij bespioneerde zo het VB. Hij maakte dat uitgerekend vandaag bekend omdat minister van Justitie Annemie Turtelboom (Open Vld) vrijdag verklaard had dat “de staatsveiligheid geen politici volgt uit hoofde van hun functie”. Volgens Debie is dat niet waar. Deze hele zaak roept nieuwe vragen op over de rol en de werking van de staatsveiligheid. We proberen de belangrijkste te beantwoorden in acht vraagjes en enkele bedenkingen.

1. WAT IS DE STAATSVEILIGHEID?

De Staatsveiligheid (SV) is België’s bekendste inlichtingendienst. Ze bestaat sinds 1831, hoort niet bij de politie, maar valt onder de verantwoordelijkheid van de Minister van Justitie. Ze zamelt inlichtingen in over al wat de veiligheid van de staat bedreigt: moslimfundamentalisten, antiglobalisten, extremisten van rechts en links. Ze speurt ook naar gevaarlijke sekten en criminele organisaties en naar de mogelijke verspreiding van gevaarlijke wapens die aanslagen (vuile bommen bv.) kunnen veroorzaken. Ze onderzoekt ook de economische spionage (zoals die bij Lernout & Hauspie).

Verder voert ze veiligheidsonderzoeken uit voor mensen die bv. bij de Navo of andere gevoelige instellingen willen gaan werken. Het gaat om honderden onderzoeken per jaar. Ze beschermt – in opdracht van de minister van Binnenlandse Zaken – ook hooggeplaatste personen (staats- en regeringsleiders en hun familie). In 2011 ging het om 100 opdrachten.

2. WAT GING VOORAF?

Vooraf: een woordje geschiedenis.

Op 15 oktober 1830 werd Isidore Plaisant (sic) de eerste administrateur-generaal van de Staatsveiligheid, die toen nog Openbare Veiligheid heette. Ze moest vooral orangisten opsporen, Belgen die aansluiting bij Nederland zochten.

Naarmate de negentiende eeuw vorderde, ging de Openbare Veiligheid alle buitenlanders in kaart brengen. De politie moest vanaf 1840 dagelijks een lijst van gegevens over iedere buitenlander op het grondgebied bezorgen (biografie, financiën, activiteiten). In die periode stroomden vele vluchtelingen België binnen, onder hen Karl Marx. De arbeidersbeweging en de Vlaamse beweging waren twee andere interessepunten van de Openbare Veiligheid. Omdat ze sinds haar ontstaan een personeels- en geldtekort had, deed ze veel een beroep op informanten. Maar die namen het niet zo nauw met de deontologie. Toen de beruchte arbeidersrellen na 1886 voor het assisenhof kwamen, bleek dat hun aanstokers agenten van de Staatsveiligheid waren. Ei zo na werd de dienst opgedoekt.

In 1929 kreeg de dienst zijn nieuwe naam, maar hij bleef op dezelfde schimmige wijze werken als voorheen. Er was nog altijd geen wettelijke regeling, hoewel die al in 1830 als ‘hoogst dringend’ was aangekondigd. Op het einde van de vorige eeuw kwam die er toch: in 1991 ontstond het Comité I, dat de Staatsveiligheid in opdracht van het parlement zou controleren, in 1998 – na 167 jaar – kwam er een wet op de Staatsveiligheid. De dienst kreeg toen de meeste van zijn huidige taken. Pas in 2010 kwam er dan op initiatief van senator Hugo Vandenberghe (CD&V) een behoorlijk strenge “BIM-wet”, een wet die de bijzondere inlichtingenmethoden van de SV regelt.

3. WIE WERKT BIJ DE SV?

Wie werkt bij de SV?

Ze heeft officieel 650 personeelsleden – naast een onbekend aantal informanten – en een budget van 45 miljoen. Ze wordt sinds 2006 geleid door Alain Winants, een Brussels parketmagistraat van liberalen huize. Zijn mandaat is eigenlijk al afgelopen, hij moet binnenkort worden vervangen. Maar hij kan opnieuw kandideren. De meest genoemde tegenkandidaat is Cédric Visart de Bocarmé, voormalig procureur-generaal van Luik en voormalig kabinetschef van minister Joëlle Milquet (cdH).

Einde november 2012 klaagde de grote baas van de SV erover dat zijn dienst te weinig personeel en middelen heeft, vooral om het dreigende salafisme, het moslimextremisme dus, te volgen. Dat salafisme is volgens Alain Winants momenteel het grootste gevaar voor de democratie.

Justititiminister Annemie Turtelboom ontkende echter dat de SV te weinig geld en personeel heeft. “De begroting van de staatsveiligheid is de jongste zeven jaar met 82% gestegen, van 23,86 miljoen in 2003 naar 43,46 miljoen in 2010. De voorbije twee jaren had de SV vaak moeilijkheden om het geld dat ze kreeg ook te besteden”, zo zegde ze op 27 november 2011 in de Kamercommissie Justitie aan Michel Doomst (CD&V). “De staatsveiligheid kreeg in 2010 82 nieuwe personeelsleden, terwijl er 32 vertrokken. Voor 2011 zijn de cijfers: 21 nieuwkomers, 25 vertrekkers. Ik zal nu met het topmanagement van de staatsveiligheid overleggen over de prioriteiten van de dienst”, zo besloot ze.

4. WAT MAG DE STAATSVEILIGHEID DOEN?

4.1. Wat màg de staatsveiligheid doen?

De SV maakt financiële analyses, bestudeert pamfletten en boeken, volgt vergaderingen van extremistische groepen en gaat na hoe groot hun actiekracht is. Ze kan daarvoor een beroep doen op alle openbare bronnen en ook op informanten. De SV is géén politiedienst, ze doet geen gerechtelijke onderzoeken en verricht geen aanhoudingen.

Tot 1998 was er dus geen enkele wet die de SV reglementeerde. En pas in 2010 kwam er een BIM-wet die de methoden die de SV mag gebruiken om inlichtingen in te zamelen, wettelijk vastlegt. Sinds dan zijn er gewone, specifieke en bijzondere methoden. De gewone bestuderen open bronnen (kranten, openbare verslagen, vergaderingen, gebruik van informanten e.d.).

Daarnaast heb je de specifieke methoden: observatie van een openbare plaats (of van een private plaats die toegankelijk is voor het publiek, zoals een discotheek of een kerk) met technische middelen (bv. een camera); doorzoeking van dit soort plaatsen met technische middelen; kennis nemen van de afzender of de geadresseerde van post of van de eigenaar van een postbus; kennisnemen van wie telefoneert met wie of van het IP-adres van een computer. De bijzondere methoden zijn: de observatie in woningen; het oprichten van een front store (een nepbedrijf of nepvzw om zo inlichtingen in te zamelen, nvdr); doorzoeking van private plaatsen; openen van post; inzamelen van gegevens op bankrekeningen; hacken van computers, behalve die van de overheid; telefoontap.

Een speciale BIM-commissie van drie magistraten moet op voorhand ingelicht worden van de specifieke methoden en voor de uitzonderlijke methoden moet ze op voorhand toestemming geven. Die BIM-commissie kan ook beslissen dat de SV misdrijven mag plegen, als dat absoluut nodig is voor het werk van de agenten (valse naamdracht, overtredingen van de wegcode….) en als het misdrijf in verhouding staat tot het doel dat wordt nagestreefd. In geen geval mag ze iemand’s fysieke integriteit schenden. Moorden kunnen dus – in tegenstelling tot bij de CIA, die van president Obama Osama bin Laden mocht vermoorden – in België niet.

4.2. Wat doét de staatsveiligheid?

Volgens het Comité I past de SV in 2011 731 keer specifieke methoden toe (grotendeels opvragen van telefoon- en gsm-nummers: 1.892 nummers in totaal) en 33 keer uitzonderlijke methoden toe (11 keer ging het om afluisteren van telefoons en 10 keer om inkijken van bankverrichtingen. Veertien operaties werden door de BIM-controlecommissie stopgezet.

5. HOE WERKT DE CONTROLE?

De staatsveiligheid wordt sinds 1991 gecontroleerd door het Comité I. Dat bestaat uit drie (politiek benoemde) personen: twee magistraten (onder wie voorzitter Guy Rapaille, een Luiks magistraat van PS-signatuur) en één ambtenaar. Dat Comité controleert de inlichtingendiensten: naast de staatsveiligheid, controleert het dus ook de militaire veildigheid ADIV. Iedere burger kan klacht indienen bij het Comité I als hij meent dat de staatsveiligheid zijn boekje te buiten ging. Het Comité I kan ook audits en toezichtonderzoeken over de staatsveiligheid of over bepaalde aspecten doen en daarvoor alle documenten opvragen.

Het Comité I wordt op zijn beurt gecontroleerd door een parlementaire begeleidingscommissie in de Senaat. Die staat onder leiding van Senaatsvoorzitter Sabine de Bethune (CD&V) en bestaat verder uit telkens één lid van PS, MR, N-VA en CD&V. Het VB wordt al sinds jaar en dag uit deze begeleidingscommissie geweerd, CD&V heeft twee leden in de begeleidingscommissie.

Daarnaast heb je nog de BIM-commissie, die toezicht houdt op de methoden van de SV. Zij moet voor de zwaarste methoden op voorhand toestemming geven en kan die methoden zelfs stopzetten bij misbruik. De BIM-commissie wordt voorgezeten door de Antwerpse onderzoeksrechter Paul Van Santvliet. De BIM-commissie bestaat verder nog uit twee magistraten, onder wie de Mechelse rechter Viviane Deckmyn.

6. KAN U UW DOSSIER INZIEN?

Kan U Uw dossier van de staatsveiligheid inzien?

Nee. Iedereen kan zijn dossier bij de staatsveiligheid laten inzien door de privacycommissie. Rechtstreeks Uw dossier inkijken kan U niet. De privacycommissie mag dat wel, maar ze mag U niet zeggen wat ze in Uw dossier gelezen heeft en ze kan alleen maar aanbevelingen doen om iets aan Uw dossier te veranderen. Maar ook daarover mag ze U niets vertellen. En de staatsveiligheid moet geen rekening houden met de aanbevelingen van de privacycommissie. In feite heeft U dus geen controle op wat in Uw dossier bij de staatsveiligheid staat.

Iedere burger kan ook klacht tegen de staatsveiligheid indienen bij het Comité I, maar dat doet dan hetzelfde als de privacycommissie, met dezelfde mogelijkheden en beperkingen. Het Comité I kan wel een en ander hierover publiceren in zijn jaarverslag.

U kan U ook tot de voogdijminister (justitieminister Turtelboom) wenden. Zij is baas van de staatsveiligheid en kan ook een en ander laten onderzoeken. Maar zij is net zoals Alain Winants gebonden door een geheimhoudingsplicht.

Als de BIM-wet op U werd toegepast, als dus een specifieke of uitzonderlijke inlichtingenmethode is gebruikt, dan kan U aan de baas van de staatsveiligheid hierover informatie vragen. Hij moet dan het juridisch kader schetsen waarin de methode werd toegepast en U kan dan aan het Comité I vragen om dat te controleren. U moet wel een wettig belang aantonen, de bewuste methode moet minstens vijf jaar beëindigd zijn en in die vijf jaar mogen geen nieuwe gegevens over U ingezameld zijn. Bovendien moeten de wetten op de veiligheidsmachtigingen, de privacy en de openbaarheid van bestuur nageleefd worden. U moet ook zelf informatie over de BIM-methodes vragen, men licht U niet automatisch in. En omdat men dat niet doet, kan U natuurlijk helemaal niet weten of er een BIM-methode op jou is toegepast. Deze hele regeling werd overigens op 22 september 2011 door het Grondwettelijk Hof vernietigd. Dat Hof vond dat de staatsveiligheid zelf de betrokkene moet inlichten zodra dat kan zonder hun onderzoek in gevaar te brengen. Door deze vernietiging vervalt de hele regeling tot het parlement een nieuwe heeft goedgekeurd.

7. WAT IS DE ZAAK-DEBIE?

== Bart Debie verklaarde vandaag dat hij tussen 2007 en 2010 informant was van de staatsveiligheid. Hij had dit zelf voorgesteld aan de dienst en kreeg hier naar eigen zeggen geen geld voor. Hij kwam vandaag met zijn verklaring omdat hij boos was omdat minister Turtelboom had gezegd dat de staatsveiligheid geen politici volgt. Naar eigen zeggen koos hij ook dit moment omdat er geen verkiezingen in zicht zijn en zijn verklaringen “dus geen electorale invloed kunnen hebben”.

Debie was commissaris bij de Antwerpse politie, waar hij morgen exact tien jaar weg is. Hij werd samen met de huidige korpschef Serge Muyters bekend omdat hij het Falconplein “opkuiste”. Maar Debie’s methodes waren – volgens justitie – nogal hardhandig. Hij werd op donderdag 31 januari 2008 door het Antwerpse Hof van Beroep veroordeeld tot vier jaar cel, waarvan één effectief omdat hij 12 allochtone arrestanten, onder wie een minderjarige, wel erg hardhandig had aangepakt: geslagen, geschopt, tegen het hoofd gestampt. Volgens het Hof was zijn bijnaam in het korps was “Bart Penalty”. Debie werd bovendien gestraft voor vervalsing van processen-verbaal, racisme tegen vier Turken en nog enkele andere dingen.

Debie zelf heeft altijd beweerd dat hij onschuldig was en dat binnen de politie een complot tegen hem was gesmeed. Op zijn weblog zegt hij dat hij wil aantonen dat hij helemaal geen racist is. “Mijn partner is nota bene een moslima van Afrikaanse origine. Zij werkt als professioneel fotomodel en verkeert in de kringen van zogenaamde bekende mensen. En als zij daar dan soms vertelt wie haar man is, dan vallen er wel eens monden open van verbazing”, zo schrijft hij.

Debie moest zijn straf niet uitzitten, maar kreeg een enkelband. Hij was toen al lang weg bij de Antwerpse politie, want hij ging al sinds 2004 bij het VB werken. Daar werd hij veiligheidsadviseur van Filip Dewinter. In 2007 nam hij contact op met de staatsveiligheid. Naar eigen zeggen omdat Dewinter hem had gevraagd om voor enkele kalashnikovs te zorgen. Dewinter wilde die hebben voor een persconferentie waarop hij gebruik van geweld met kalashnikovs wilde aanklagen naar aanleiding van een schietpartij in Brussel. Debie wilde die kalashnikovs niet zoeken “omdat dit een misdrijf was en hij al een strafblad had”. De veiligheidsadviseur was het ook beu dat de partijtop geen rekening hield zijn zijn eerdere klachten over het gedrag van de VB-jongeren in Dilbeek, “die ramen van winkeliers met opschriften in twee talen hadden gevandaliseerd” en over een medewerker van voormalig VB-voorzitter Bruno Valkeniers, “die neonaziconcerten met Blood and Honour organiseerde”. Debie: “Ik had dit allemaal intern aangeklaagd, maar de partijleiding deed er niets mee. Vandaar mijn stap naar de staatsveiligheid”.

Na zijn voorstel aan de staatsveiligheid kreeg hij naar eigen zeggen in Vilvoorde bezoek van iemand van die dienst. Die wilde vooral weten welke zakenlui het VB sponsorden en wie er deelnam aan de fundraising dinners die Dewinter organiseerde. De SV was verder geïnteresseerd in een Amerikaan die overal in de wereld anti-islambewegingen wilde financieren. Volgens Debie gedroeg zijn begeleider bij de SV zich heel correct: “Ik moet wel zeggen dat die man zeer correct en professioneel was. In het privéleven van Dewinter was hij niet geïnteresseerd. Het was hem te doen om de geldstromen en de contacten. Ik heb hem daar hopen documenten en informatie over bezorgd.”

Debie werd in 2010 uit het VB gezet omdat hij zich op Facebook vrolijk had gemaakt over de kanker van Marie-Rose Morel. Maar hijzelf ontkent dat dit zo was.

Debie zegde gisteren dat zijn straf helemaal is afgelopen dat hij momenteel een verzoek tot eerherstel heeft ingediend bij het Antwerpse Hof van Beroep. Hij werkt momenteel als zelfstandige, hij organiseert bedrijfsopleidingen over dringende medische hulp, zo zegt hij.

== De staatsveiligheid liet vandaag weten dat “een aantal verklaringen van Debie volledig verkeerd en onjuist zijn”. Welke verklaringen dat zijn, zegt de dienst er niet hij. De SV wil ook niet bevestigen of ontkennen dat Debie informant bij haar was. De dienst legt nooit uit wie haar informanten zijn. Wel wijst de SV erop dat Debie een misdrijf heeft gepleegd als hij effectief informant van de staatsveiligheid was én dat zelf openbaar heeft gemaakt. Want wie dit soort geheime informatie bekend maakt kan tot 6 maanden cel en 3.000 euro boete krijgen.

Debie hierover: “Dit schrikt mij niet af. Men zal het eerst en vooral moeten bewijzen en de staatsveiligheid mag zelf niet zeggen wie haar informanten zijn. Dat bewijs leveren lijkt me dus moeilijk. Ik vraag me bovendien af of ik officieel wel een “informant” was. Niemand van de staatsveiligheid heeft mij ooit gewezen op die geheimhoudingsplicht”.

Winants herhaalde vandaag dat de staatsveiligheid geen parlementsleden, politici of politieke partijen volgt, screent of schaduwt vanwege hun parlementaire activiteiten. “Maar we zijn wel bevoegd om een aantal bedreigingen te onderzoeken, waaronder extremisme. Fondsenwerving uit het buitenland voor het opzetten van anti-islambewegingen zou daaronder kunnen vallen”, verwijst hij naar de uitspraken van Debie, evenwel “zonder die te bevestigen”.

== Filip Dewinter reageerde verbolgen op de verklaringen van Debie. Hij “voelde zich verraden door een goede vriend, die hij in moeilijke situaties altijd had gesteund”. Hij overweegt een klacht tegen Debie. De ex-veiligheidsadviseur hierover: “Dit schrikt mij niet af, klacht indienen is een sport geworden”. Dewinter wil verder justitieminister Annemie Turtelboom over de zaak interpelleren. Hij vraagt dat de privacycommissie zijn gegevens nakijkt en dat Turtelboom zijn persoonlijk dossier aan hem bezorgt. Turtelboom zelf heeft bij het Comité I al een onderzoek over deze zaak gevraagd, zo liet ze weten.

== Het Comité I wilde vandaag geen commentaar geven op de verklaringen van Winants, Turtelboom en Dewinter omdat het onderzoek van het Comité I naar deze problematiek nog bezig is.

8. WAT IS HET RUIMER KADER VAN DE ZAAK-DEBIE?

Wat is het ruimer kader van de zaak-Debie? In ieder geval stelt deze zaak opnieuw de rol van de staatsveiligheid aan de orde. Volgt de dienst nu politici of niet? Dat kwam vorige week al aan bod in de Scientology-zaak.

8.1. Waarover ging de Scientology-zaak?

Hierover was vorige week veel te doen naar aanleiding van het lekken van twee geheime rapporten van de staatsveiligheid over de invloed van de schadelijke sekten Scientology, Sahaja Yoga en de Moslimbroederschap. In die rapporten stonden namen van politici. Diverse politici wilden weten hoe de staatsveiligheid met deze gegevens omsprong en of politici worden gevolgd. “Waarom krijgt de Koning dit rapport? Krijgt hij alle rapporten? Ook rapporten over Opus Dei?”, zo vroeg Stefaan Van Hecke (Groen). Turtelboom legde vorige vrijdag een en ander uit in de Kamercommissie Justitie.

Een eerste rapport werd alleen elektronisch ter beschikking gesteld. Het ging over de invloed van Scientology op de Congolese gemeenschap in België. Volgens Turtelboom kregen slechts 6 personen van buiten de staatsveiligheid dat eerste elektronisch rapport. “Daarnaast konden ook sommige medewerkers van de staatsveiligheid het inzien, maar omdat het elektronisch is, kan ieder manoeuvre van deze mensen geregistreerd worden. De Koning kreeg dit eerste rapport niet.”

Het tweede rapport was schriftelijk. Het ging naar 67 mensen, onder wie 43 van buiten de staatsveiligheid. Het was een fenomeenanalyse over de invloed van sekten zoals Scientology, Sahaja Yoga en de Moslimbroederschap. De Koning kreeg dat rapport wel. In dat rapport werden de namen van politici zoals Maggie De Block, Tony Van Parys, Elio Di Rupo en Rik Torfs vermeld. Maar wel als gecontacteerde personen. Het Comité I kreeg beide rapporten.

8.2. Wat deed Turtelboom?

Turtelboom zegde dat zij zelf aan het Comité I heeft gevraagd om een onderzoek naar beide lekken in te stellen. “Mensen kunnen zo’n geheim rapport maar inzien als ze daarvoor een aparte veiligheidsmachtiging hebben en bovendien als de informatie uit het rapport nuttig is voor hun werk. Wie die rapporten lekt kan tot 5 jaar cel en 30.000 euro boete krijgen”, waarschuwde de minister. Ze bevestigde nog dat de staatsveiligheid een klacht met burgerlijke partijstelling heeft ingediend, zodat de lekken nu ook onderzocht worden door het gerecht.

De minister zegde dat “geen parlementsleden worden gevolgd uit hoofde van hun functie en dat er ook geen dossiers worden bijgehouden van parlementsleden”. Turtelboom zegde dat de Koning “niet alle rapporten krijgt, maar alleen die waarvan de staatsveiligheid vindt dat het Hof ze moet krijgen. Koning Albert kreeg slechts één van de twee gelekte rapporten”.

Minister Turtelboom heeft naar aanleiding van deze lekken een onderzoek gevraagd bij het Comité I. Dat moet een aantal vragen beantwoorden. “Ik vroeg aan het Comité I om na te gaan hoe het aantal bestemmelingen van dit soort rapporten kan worden beperkt. Er moeten bovendien duidelijke criteria komen op grond waarvan geheime rapporten worden verspreid aan wie. Verder moet het Comité I nagaan of de namen van politici niet kunnen worden gedepersonaliseerd of minstens in categorieën opgesomd, zodat duidelijk wordt of een politicus gecontacteerd werd, effectief contact had of de organisatie steunde of niet”.

Turtelboom wil in de toekomst ook dat de minister van justitie een aparte nota krijgt als de staatsveiligheid politici vermeldt in een geheim rapport. Want in het dossier van Scientology gebeurde dat niet, terwijl het al van in 2009 zou moeten.

8.3. Hoe reageert het VB?

Het VB gelooft er niets van. In een reactie zegde senator Filip Dewinter dat politici van het VB en de PVDA wel degelijk gevolgd. “Dat blijkt uit de lijst van te volgen staatsbedreigende organisaties die opgesteld wordt door de staatsveiligheid en de federale politie. De lijst bestaat uit drie categorieën: code rood, code oranje en code geel. Code rood betreft terreurorganisaties zoals o.a. Hizb-Ut-Tahir (partij van de extremistische moslims), GIA (Algerijnse terreurorganisatie), de PKK, de DHKPC (de groep rond Feyrihe Erdal) en Blood and Honour. Code oranje betreft onder meer Sharia4belgium, de Outlaws/Hells Angels, de (Turkse) Grijze Wolven en Internationaal Verzet (anarchisten). Onder code Geel vallen onder meer Vlaams Belang en PVDA. Hun mandatarissen worden dus wel degelijk – in tegenstelling tot wat minister van Justitie Turtelboom beweert – actief gevolgd door de politiediensten en de staatsveiligheid”. Voor Dewinter is zo’n lijst “wel degelijk nuttig en nodig,maar enkel voor terroristische en subversieve organisaties die geweld willen plegen of oproepen tot het gebruik van geweld”.

“Het volgen van partijen zoals het Vlaams Belang is ondemocratisch en neigt naar Stasipraktijken. Blijkbaar worden vooral Vlaams-nationale organisaties gevolgd. Onder het mom van de bescherming van de staat, beschermt de staatsveiligheid vooral de bestendiging van het Belgische regime”, stelt Filip Dewinter. In de Kamer vroeg zijn collega Bert Schoofs of de staatsveiligheid indertijd Leopold III had gevolgd, maar daarop kwam geen antwoord.

8.4. Evaluatie

Eigenlijk spreken de visies van Turtelboom/Winants en Dewinter elkaar niet tegen. Turtelboom zegt dat de staatsveiligheid geen politici volgt in hun hoedanigheid van politici. Maar de staatsveiligheid moet wel het extremisme en het radicalisme in kaart brengen, bv. bewegingen die anti-islamgroepen willen oprichten. Dan kunnen bepaalde politici in het vizier komen. Net zoals dat in de fenomeenanalyse over Scientology het geval was. Alain Winants van de SV bevestigde dat nog eens vandaag. Hij zegde daarbij niet meer van wat al in zijn jaarverslag over 2011 stond. Turtelboom wil nu dat ze bij ieder rapport waarin een politicus wordt vernoemd een aparte nota krijgt waarin verwezen wordt naar die politicus en zijn rol in het onderzoek.

9. WAARHEEN MET DE STAATSVEILIGHEID?

9.1. Deze eeuw kwam de staatsveiligheid al meerdere malen in opspraak. Zo waren er de klachten dat zij het moslimextremisme niet efficiënt kon opvolgen uit misbegrepen politiek-correct gedrag en dat ze onvoldoende alert was geweest in de opvolging van het Putse koppel Sayadi-Vinck dat door de VN op een terroristenlijst was gezet, maar daar ondertussen weer is afgehaald. Deze klachten gelden nu zeker niet meer: het salafisme is nu een topprioriteit voor de staatsveiligheid. En de staatsveiligheid kon al een reeks terreurnetwerken ontmaskeren vooraleer ze actief waren. De dienst leert dus wel degelijk uit de kritieken van het Comité I, dat hiermee ook zijn nut heeft bewezen.

Er was deze eeuw ook de ophef rond de ontsnapping van de Turkse DHKPC-terroriste Feyrihe Erdal. Dat kon gebeuren omdat de auto van de SV die Erdal achtervolgde voor een rood licht moest stoppen. Door de BIM-wet wordt dit probleem opgelost, want voortaan mogen agenten van de SV verkeersmisdrijven plegen.

Er was ook heisa over de informantenwerking van de staatsveiligheid, toen bleek dat een van haar informanten, Abdelkader Belliraj in België zes moorden zou hebben gepleegd en in Marokko werd vervolgd voor terrorisme. De problematiek van het informantenbeheer werd eveneens aangepakt door de BIM-wet van 2010, die de bijzondere inlichtingenmethodes regelt.

Recent nog was er de veroordeling van Justitieminister Turtelboom tot 100.000 euro morele schadevergoeding omdat de staatsveiligheid in 1981 in een gelekte geheime nota foutieve en lasterlijke informatie had verspreid over de omstreden baron Benoît de Bonvoisin, die toen door de staatsveiligheid de “zwarte baron” en financier van extreem-rechts werd genoemd. Deze nota’s dateren evenwel uit de tijd dat de staatsveiligheid nog helemaal niet gereglementeerd was en de mysterieuze Albert Raes de dienst nog leidde.

9.2. De discussie in de zaak-Debie keert periodisch weer. Ze gaat echter niet alleen over de vraag of politici door de staatsveiligheid mogen worden gevolgd of niet. Maar ook over het statuut van de staatsveiligheid zelf. Eerder al vonden het VB en de sp.a dat de SV als aparte dienst moet worden afgeschaft en moet worden ondergebracht bij de politie. Die laatste kan in principe alleen maar inlichtingen over misdrijven inzamelen nadat die misdrijven gepleegd zijn. Maar sinds een decennium kan ze ook “zachte informatie”, info over verdachte personen en situaties zonder dat een misdrijf is gepleegd, inzamelen. Dat kan natuurlijk tot overlappingen leiden op sommige domeinen (criminele organisaties bv.). De politie mag echter alleen maar zachte informatie inzamelen met het oog op criminele feiten, de SV mag dit ook met het oog op de gevaren voor de democratie. De vraag naar de “plaats” van de staatsveiligheid (bij justitie of bij de politie) komt onvermijdelijk opnieuw aan de orde.

…

11/02 John de Wit 11 FEBRUARI 2013 –

Find this story at 11 February 2013

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