site.btaDeputy PM Kalfin: Entire Mechanism of Disclosing State Security Archives Is Unnecessary, Disclosure Committee Should be Closed

Deputy PM Kalfin: Entire Mechanism of  Disclosing State Security Archives Is Unnecessary,  Disclosure Committee Should be Closed

Pleven, North Central Bulgaria, May 29 (BTA) - The entire
mechanism of disclosing intelligence archives is unnecessary and
harmful to the State, and the Committee on Disclosure of
Documents and Announcing Bulgarian Citizens' Affiliation to
State Security and the Intelligence Services of the Bulgarian
People's Army should be closed, Deputy Prime Minister and ABV
member Ivailo Kalfin said in reply to a journalist's question
at a BTA-hosted news conference in Pleven Thursday.

"Twenty-six year after the democratic changes, I do not believe
that the archives contain the whole information and that the
contained information is objective," Kalfin went on to say.
"These practically are people who have worked for the State. I
can tell you that when a diplomat also works for the
intelligence services, this is the most normal practice in 90
per cent of the cases, and not only in Bulgaria. At present, the
only victims of the illegitimate lustration are those diplomats
who the President refuses to appoint as ambassadors because
they have done their job, and who are exceptional professionals
who have worked for Bulgaria," he commented.

Kalfin also said that he find the entire disclosure process
vicious and that the Disclosure Committee should be closed or
transformed, following the examples of other countries, into a
Historical Memory Centre or something else. The State should
preserve its archives and documents related to State Security if
possible, he noted. The Disclosure Committee has proven that it
cannot preserve information which should not be leaked, he
added.

ABV Deputy Chair Roumen Petkov said that the delivery of the
military intelligence archives to the Disclosure Committee, as
requested by Defence Minister Nikolay Nenchev on Wednesday, is a
flagrant mistake which will have irreversible consequences for
Bulgaria's security and defence. According to Petkov, this is a
risky step because the Disclosure Committee is not ready to keep
secret the identity of the foreign nationals who have
collaborated with Bulgarian military intelligence. "I cannot see
which foreigners will commit to working with our intelligence
services from now onwards," he commented, describing the
disclosure of the military intelligence archives as a crime.