The Internal Security Bureau (IDB) has detained the head of the State Border Guard Guntis Pujāts.
The Minister of the Interior Sandis Ģirģens (KPV LV) will not comment at the moment, his adviser Beata Jonite told LETA.
At present, LETA has not been able to contact the IDB and find out in which criminal proceedings the detention took place.
Kristīne Pētersone, a spokeswoman for the State Border Guard, told LETA that IDB employees had arrived at the State Border Guard headquarters on Rūdolfa Street in Riga on Friday. Petersone did not comment on whether the IDB had carried out investigative activities at the headquarters, as such information could be provided only by the IDB itself. Petersone also did not comment on where Pujat is currently.
The law provides that a person may be detained for up to 48 hours. The person must then be released or remanded in custody, the most severe of which is detention. The court decides on the application of detention.
However, a security measure can only be applied if a person acquires the status of a suspect. If a person acquires the status of a person against whom criminal proceedings have been initiated, then security measures may not be applied to this person.
LETA has already written that last year the IDB detained the former head of the State Border Guard Normunds Garbars. He was detained in connection with a case assessing possible crimes in the construction process regarding the construction of the infrastructure of the Latvian-Russian border strip and the construction of the Latvian-Belarusian border.
There are several criminal proceedings in the IDB proceedings related to the construction and equipping of the state’s eastern border – in these voluminous and complex criminal proceedings, the acquisition and consolidation of evidence in accordance with the law is still ongoing.
The loudest case mentioned in the IDB records is related to Garbars and the current Deputy Chief of the Border Guard Juris Martukāns.
In the voluminous criminal proceedings, the IDB office is investigating possible criminal offenses in the construction processes in the construction and installation of the country’s eastern border zone, carried out in the VRS procurement for the construction of the Latvian-Russian border zone infrastructure and the Latvian-Belarusian border.
The total procurement amount for the construction of the country’s eastern border exceeds 40 million euros. In September last year, the IDB detained four persons who had been granted the status of a suspect in criminal proceedings. Among the detainees were Garbars and SIA “Ceļu būvniecības sabiedrība” Igate “” chairman and co-owner Māris Peilāns.
Pujāts has previously publicly criticized Valters Mūrnieks, the head of IDB. Pujāts announced in October last year that he would turn to the General Prosecutor’s Office regarding possible violations in IDB investigations against border guards.
“Any, even the slightest, pretext is used to initiate criminal proceedings against our employees after the maximum program,” Pujāts, the head of the border guard, told the newspaper “Neatkarīgā Rīta Avīze” last autumn.
On March 3, Mūrnieks announced on TV3 that the Border Guard was the only institution of the internal affairs structure that absolutely did not want to cooperate with the IDB and even countered it.
This year, on March 5, Mūrnieks and Pujāts arrived at the Minister of the Interior for talks. After the meeting, Gürgens announced that issues of mutual communication were discussed during the meeting. “The axes of war have been removed. Each institution has its own functions, which they perform in accordance with the laws and regulations,” the minister said at the time.
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