Telephone Intervention

El Mercurio de Valparaíso, Wednesday, August 14, 2019

This medium published a telephone intervention carried out in 2017 by the Army Intelligence Directorate. Some points that should be clarified regarding this operation:

1) We know it was a legal interception operation, as it was authorized by a minister of the Court of Appeals designated for this purpose.

2) Intelligence, counterintelligence, and military security operations are secret due to the very nature of what is being investigated. Since they are necessary, but also carry the risk of being misused, controls such as the aforementioned authorizations and oversight by the courts and a commission of the Chamber of Deputies that exists for these purposes are put in place.

3) The operations of the DINE are under the responsibility of the general in charge of that division, with no responsibility for the CJE or its Chief of Staff. The DINE in these matters is independent, and its control and oversight are detailed in Law 19.974, also known as the Intelligence Law.

4) Even if the CJE or the Chief of Staff had information, they could not comment on intelligence operations, as doing so would lead to imprisonment for discussing matters subject to confidentiality. The same applies to any member of the DINE or the organizations responsible for overseeing it.

5) While this particular operation may attract public attention, the same would happen with any intelligence operation that becomes public knowledge. The nature of the subjects being investigated is perfectly suited for movie scripts.

Intelligence operations are secret and must remain so, but at the same time, we must ensure that they are legal, authorized, and supervised.

Richard Kouyoumdjian Inglis
Vice President, AthenaLab

Source: El Mercurio de Valparaíso