SPP - Documentary

ATTEMPTS AGAINST THE LIFE, PHYSICAL INTEGRITY, FREEDOM OF ACTION AND HEALTH OF DIGNITARIES

Starting in October 2003, the British special forces SAS and the police anti-terrorist units began the preparations for securing the Nigerian capital city and the international transport key points in the African state during the Conference of the Commonwealth Heads of Government, which was to take place in December, as a result of a warning received from the intelligence services, according to which Queen Elizabeth II could be one of al-Qaeda’s targets. Although not officially confirmed, as the authorities in London never discuss the security measures taken for the Queen’s travels, the SAS presence in Nigeria was considered the best solution for a monarch who do not change his/her schedule as a result of terrorist threats. To put it in a more concrete manner, the intelligence gathered by the secret services showed that the al-Qaeda agents were hoping to capitalize on the weak points of the security services in Nigeria - a Muslim country - in order to reach their goals during the summit. As a reply, the Nigerian police assured that they had established a security network to provide protection for the Queen. All these measures took into account a message broadcast in February 2003 and attributed to Ossama bin Laden who characterized the Nigerian government as supportive of the West and requested the Muslims to topple it by any means.
Anna Lindh, the Swedish Foreign Minister, was stabbed on 10 September 2003 while shopping in a department store in Stockholm and died a few hours later. SAPO, the Swedish protection service refused several times to provide protection for Anna Lindh, in spite of the numerous threats and hostile letters that she had received. The officials in the Swedish Foreign Ministry had asked SAPO to send a few body guards to protect Anna Lindh during the campaign before the euro adoption referendum. The SAPO leadership had turned down the request of the Ministry, explaining that they had no information according to which the life of the dignitary would be in danger. Bo Holmberg, the Minister’s husband, declared that she had never rejected the idea of being surrounded by body guards. At the end of September, the police arrested Mijailo Mijailovici, the suspected assassin, and his trial is under way.
Attempting to set the Balkans “on fire”, the Albanian extremists in the south of Serbia intended to assassinate the Serbian Vice Prime Minister, Nebojsa Covici, at the end of September 2003. Having intelligence according to which the Serbian official was going to travel to Presevo in order to participate in a meeting with the local authorities, the Albanian extremists organized an ambush on the road between Bujanovac and Presevo. The plans of the assailants were thwarted by a military patrol that discovered and defused the explosive material planted in the village of Rajnice, just two hours before the vehicle of the Serbian Vice Prime Minister reached that point.
In 2002, Lord Robertson, the Secretary General of NATO, was “attacked” with whipped cream at a reunion that was taking place in Russia. Embarrassment and sheer astonishment could be seen on the face of the high official - an image which all the TV stations present at the event broadcast worldwide.
Rehavam Zeevi, the resigning Minister of Tourism of Israel was shot in October 2001 in Hyatt Hotel in Jerusalem. According to the police statements, after dining together with his wife at the hotel restaurant, the former Minister went alone to his room at the eighth floor and was waited for on the corridor by two persons who fired several shots at him. Zeevi was found by his wife 10 minutes later and immediately transported to the Hadassah Ein Carem Hospital, where he died a few hours later. The radical group entitled the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine claimed the attempt, declaring that the former Minister was shot because of his ultranationalist views.
In June 2001, in Nepal, the heir prince of this state killed his entire family. After some disputes with his mother, who would not accept his marrying the daughter of a political rival, heir prince Dipendra shot all the members of his family, one by one, as well as a few distant relatives who had tried to stop him. Although the prince followed each and every victim through the palace, it is surprising that the protection forces had no reaction and did not interfere. Finally, Prince Dipendra committed suicide by the same weapon in the garden of the palace.
Some of the special situations that the protection services have to cope with stem from the private life of the dignitary or of the family members. This was the case in May 2001, when the US Secret Service informed the US President George Bush that a dangerous individual “had set the eyes” on one of his daughters. Apparently, the individual had seen Jenna Bush while she was dancing with her father at the presidency inauguration ball and had developed a fixation on her. The weird behavior of the nineteen-year-old boy alerted the agents assigned to protect the daughter of the American president and they were ready to react any time.
An embarrassing picture published in all the important newspapers of the world affected the image of a high official. This is what happened to the Swedish Minister of Finance, Bo Ringholm, whose traditional annual walk between the Ministry of Finance and the Parliament building acquired tragicomic overtones in April 2001. An individual who was demonstrating against the policy of the Ministry led by the Swedish dignitary managed to squeeze in past the security forces and threw a tart towards the Minister’s head. Thus, the image of the elegant dignitary was replaced by that of a man surprised by the unexpected gesture and trying in vain to clean away the cake from his face, hair and clothes.
In February 2001, in the United States, 47-year-old Robert Pickett got too close to the south entrance of the White House, carrying a gun. When challenged by the security forces, he fired a few shots in the air and was immediately put to the ground. Not too seriously wounded, Robert Pickett was taken immediately to the nearest hospital, where he was given medical assistance. The investigations that followed revealed the fact that he was a former governmental employee, fired a few years ago because he had committed some breaches of duty. People who knew him confirmed that Pickett, although a quiet, non-violent person, was very much affected by the fact that he had been fired, seeing himself as “a victim of a corrupt government“. His behavior to that point had not brought him into the attention of the Secret Service as a potential aggressor to the life of the President, but his desperation reached a climax when, a few days before the incident, he had lost the trial against the institution that he had worked for.
The US Secret Service was confronted with an embarrassing situation at the beginning of 2001. While walking to the place where he was going to take the presidential oath, George W. Bush noticed that a man had come closer and extended his hand towards him. Surprised to a certain extent, the President shook hands and the man left a coin in his palm. The surprise was even bigger when they discovered that the man, without the permission of the authorities, had penetrated all the cordons of the protection services, although he was just an ordinary man who had not been granted access to the area. The surprise turned into astonishment when they found out that that was not his first action of the kind. In 1997, when Bill Clinton was taking the oath for the second presidential term in office, the same man had deceived the vigilance of the presidential protection service and had shaken hands with the president, leaving a coin in his palm ...
A seemingly inoffensive accident occurred at the beginning of October 2000 in Scotland. The victim was the head of the regional Government, Donald Dewar, who slipped and fell in front of his official residence in Edinburgh. The dignitary stood up, saw that he was not seriously hurt, got in his car and left for his office where he carried on his usual activities. However, after a few hours, he felt bad and was hospitalized in the reanimation section of the biggest hospital in the city, where he was connected to an artificial respiration device. Yet, the situation became critical and in a few hours the dignitary died.
The curiosity manifested by some persons towards the private life of personalities has always represented a concern for the security services. In September 2000, the British counter-espionage service thwarted a detailed project which had the purpose of listening the phone conversations and intercepting the electronic mail of Prince William while he was attending the courses of “St. Andrews“ University in Scotland. A routine control carried out by the MI-5 specialists in the rooms of the building which the prince was supposed to inhabit revealed the existence of state-of-the-art electronic equipment.
On the eve of the municipal elections in Albania (September 2000), the former President Sali Berisha, survived an attempt which took place while he was attending an electoral rally in the south of the country. At the moment when the former president was climbing the steps towards the rostrum, somebody tried to throw a defensive grenade at him. The assailant, Enver Kapaj, a former agent of the Albanian secret police, was neutralized by Berisha’s body guards.
On 7 February 2000, the Yugoslav Minister of Defense, Pavle Bulatovici was assassinated. According to the rumors circulated in the press, the assassin participated in the plan that aimed at eliminating those from Slobodan Milosevici’s close circle.

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