The committee was put together following a letter sent by Solovieff to the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Ministry of Justice last week, in which the attorney general said she had not been informed that judicial police officials had been reassigned to a special police operation in the capital to address drug crime and cannabis prohibition. Solovieff questioned why officials responsible for economic crimes had been assigned to the operation, which was described as organised and aggressive.
The LSAP and Pirate parties requested the meeting on Thursday morning, citing the fact they had not been able to view the letter and had only learned of the issue through the press. “I note the minister has managed to break more china in three months than Villeroy & Boch produce in a year,” commented Green MP Meris Sehovic, while Pirate MP Marc Goergen said: “I feel that Mr Gloden is trying to find a larger carpet to cover everything up with.”
The two MPs criticised the fact that the judicial authorities were not involved in the decision to introduce the special operation; in addition, the operation once again focused on the capital, neglecting other municipalities in the process.
The opposition MPs also accused the home affairs minister of having told untruths in a recent interview with RTL Radio. Contrary to Gloden’s claims, the attorney general had received neither a phone call nor a text message to inform her. In a meeting, the minister is said to have stated that Solovieff should send him a text in future, instead of a letter - a “completely wrong way”, according to the Pirates’ Marc Goergen.
The LSAP, Luxembourg’s largest opposition party, also criticised the minister’s approach as an institutional framework. Special operations were initially created to target aggressive, organised begging, said MP Dan Biancalana. The fact these special operations were subsequently expanded to include drug crime had not been officially announced, nor could Gloden answer exactly how many police officers were part of the operations in total. The minister was also unable to answer questions on the number of judicial police officers on duty - 110 - nor how many officers were assigned to selected police stations.
The operation will now be reduced. “The fact that it is being withdrawn to this extent shows that our criticism was valid,” Goergen said. According to Biancalana, the project will be reduced by half.
In response to criticism of the poor communication between Gloden and Solovieff, the minister said the opposition appeared to have sat through an entirely different meeting. Gloden claimed dialogue had been constructive. “One point I can draw from the discussion is that we must continue to work on dialogue between the police and the prosecutor’s office,” he said. It was confirmed that officers from the judicial police could continue to be reassigned.
“We have to be careful not to give off the impression that there is an institutional crisis at play here,” warned ADR MP Fernand Kartheiser. He pointed out there appeared to have been a number of technical errors from the beginning, including the fact that the begging ban in Luxembourg’s capital was enforced without sufficient coordination between the relevant authorities. “There is a relatively large consensus regarding the objectives and methods of implementation,” he added.
The Greens’ Sehovic said the situation was serious. The prosecutor’s office said the special operation, in its current format, was unsuitable in terms of fulfilling the mission at stake. “It would be even worse if there was a risk that the initiated procedures could be cancelled due to a lack of respect for the law,” he said of the meeting.
As for the next steps, the opposition parties, including the LSAP, the Greens, the Left and the Pirates, filed a motion in the Chamber on Thursday in which they called upon the government to immediately withdraw all judicial police agents from the special operation. “I think the minister still has the chance to row back,” Goergen replied, when asked if an enquiry committee would be considered. But caution was advised with such a demand.
CSV Minister of Justice Elisabeth Margue has made it clear that she has no authority over the attorney general, nor over the police corps. “I think the meeting showed there was a small lack of communication for this operation,” she said, and added that she hoped for better communication between the authorities in future.
The state attorney general declined to say anything further about the whole affair.
