Czech supreme attorney wants BIS intelligence to check info leaks

Supreme State Attorney Renata Vesecka wants to ask Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek to assign the civilian counter-intelligence service (BIS) to check the information leak from the police and state attorney’s offices, she told public Czech Television (CT) yesterday. News agency CTK reports that Vesecka mentioned it in connection with the alleged corruption scandal of deputy Prime Minister Jiri Cunek, chairman of the junior ruling Christian Democrats who is suspected of having taken a bribe when he was the mayor of Vsetin, north Moravia. Cunek announced he would resign from the government since his case was re-opened. Cunek said he considers Vesecka’s request a right step as further information leak must be prevented.
Prime Minister Topolanek told Prima TV yesterday that he would interfere neither in Vesecka’s work nor in the work of the police president. It is in their power to make order in their offices, he added.
Vesecka noted that the mass information leak questioned the trustworthiness of law enforcement bodies. Apart from Cunek’s affair, Vesecka cited information leak in other cases, for instance in the corruption scandal in Czech league soccer and in the investigation into children’a maltreatment in Kurim, south Moravia, CTK notes. All these cases were supervised by the High State Attorney’s Office in Olomouc, north Moravia.
Justice Minister Jiri Pospisil dismissed Olomouc high state attorney Ivo Istvan upon Vesecka’s proposal. She said Istvan had not taken measures to prevent the leak of information about the cases that were being investigated.
Istvan dismissed the criticism.  Opposition Communist chairman Vojtech Filip said he agreed with Vesecka’s intention, but it came too late since the situation should have been solved before the general election in June 2006, CTK adds.